USA > Ohio > Hamilton County > Cincinnati > Centennial history of Cincinnati and representative citizens, Vol. I, Pt. 2 > Part 43
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to another and then to another. At times the ice would sink beneath her, when she would slide her child to another cake and pull herself on with her hands and thus continue her journey. She became completely soaked with ice water and hier hands were benumbed with cold, but she made her way from one ice floe to another until she reached the Ohio side near Ripley, where she sank exhausted. Here a man standing on the bank, who had been watching her with amaze- ment and horror, assisted her and shortly after- wards she was forwarded to Coffin's house, then a few miles below Cincinnati. She afterwards reached Canada, where she lived many years.
THIE SCANLAN MOB.
In 1843 Cincinnati had the shame of harboring a mob, which however did no damage. A man from New Orleans named Scanlan visited the city and in his family was a little slave girl about 10 years old, named Lavinia. The mother of this child had carefully instructed her daugh- ter as to her rights whenever, with the consent of her father and master, her feet touched the free soil of Ohio. She told her that if she did not attempt to escape when in Ohio she would punish her severely on her return. She herself intended to escape and to identify her daughter if she should meet her years afterwards in Can- ada she put about her neck a small gold chain. When the child reached Ohio she remembered her instructions and wistfully looked into the face of each stranger in the hopes of finding aid. A colored couple finally assisted hier in escaping to the house of Samuel Reynolds, the Quaker, who lived near the foot of Sycamore liill, near
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Broadway . and Liberty. The little girl was dressed in boy's clothes and remained concealed for some days but her whereabouts were discov- ered. Finally for better safe-keeping she was moved to the house of Edward Harwood, a neighbor, with whom lived John H. Coleman and family, all strong abolitionists. One even- ing as the children were playing in the yard a big watch dog was heard growling and taking this as a warning that strangers were in the neighborhood she was called in just in time it seems to escape the grasp of her father, who was concealed in the shrubbery. The following night Scanlan walked boldly into the house and de- manded his child, but as he was unable to find her he went after assistance. He went down town to the Alhambra saloon on Third street, between Main and Sycamore, where after dis- pensing liquor freely he succeeded in gathering a crowd of roughs about him to assist him in catching his slave. The Harwoods and Cole- mans on the other hand took advantage of the interval to collect their friends about them. Finally a large crowd gathered about Coleman's house headed by an officer notorious for his zeal in capturing slaves. A demand on the part of Coleman that he should show his warrant discon- certed the officer, as of course there was no proc- ess by which he coukl search the house under such circumstances. The crowd continued to increase, however, owing to the speeches and liquor of Scanlan and the Colemans assisted by young Alf Burnett proceeded to fill the house with guns and ammunition, fearing that they would be obliged to resist violence. The sheriff of the county, John H. Gerard, had been ap- pealed to for protection by the Colemans but he had refused any assistance with the statement that if they made themselves obnoxious to their neighbors they must suffer the consequences. The little girl in the meantime was once more clad in boy's clothes and accompanied by Mr. Har- wood, Mr. Coleman, Albert Lewis and others was taken to the house of Mr. Emery at the foot of the hill. The howling mob continued to occupy the streets for some hours, but as they knew that there were about 30 or 40 abolitionists all armed within the house they were afraid to make any attack. Finally they drifted down town where a number of them attacked the house of Mr. Burnett on Fifth street, storming it and breaking in the windows. Mr. Burnett collected the stones in barrels and kept them for years as specimens of pro-slavery arguments. The little girl remained at Mr. Emery's for a
week or so when, once more dressed in boy's clothes, she followed some boys who drove cows out to pasture on the hills and was taken by them to a station on the "Underground Railway" and sent North.
THE FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW.
As is well known, the passage of the Fugitive Slave Law in 1850 and the scenes accompanying its enforcement involved greater political conse- quences to this country than probably any other legislative act in its history. The irrepressible conflict between freedom and slavery which had been going on for so many years was brought to a climax by this brutal law which in its horribly minute details and in the refusal of jury trial was in the opinion of the best authorities both at that time and the present not only unconsti- tutional but absolutely inhuman. By its pro- visions United States commissioners were given the powers of judges with relation to fugitive slaves and the marshals were required to execute writs under penalty on refusal of $1,000 fine or the full value of the slave. The commissioner upon application was directed to give the claim- ant a certificate to enable him to remove his fugitive slave to the place whence he had es- caped. In no case was the testimony of the fugi- tive to be received and the certificate of the com- missioner was conclusive, thus practically siis- pending the writ of habeas corpus. The passage of the act gave a sudden and great impetus to the search for fugitive slaves in the North, which was accompanied by various revolting cir- cumstances, brutality in the captors, bloodshed, and attempts at suicide. Many persons who had been residents of the North for years were sud- denly seized and taken South as fugitive slaves and these arrests and the circumstances attending them as well as the provisions of the law which made all citizens subject to be called on as slave captors served to arouse feeling against the act.
Several of the most celebrated cases under the act were tried in Cincinnati and during the few years prior to the war this city became the scene of the most revolting episodes in the long strug- gle against the curse of bondage.
THE M'QUERRY CASE.
The first case to be tried under this act in this district was that of Wash MeQuerry before Justice John McLean of the Supreme Court of the United States on August 16 and 17, 1853. The fugitive was a bright, well built and in- telligent mulatto about 28 years old. He with
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three others had escaped some four years before from their master, Henry Miller, who lived about 50 miles back of Louisville. In the pursuit that followed one was captured but the other three crossed the Ohio above Louisville in the night on a skiff which in the absence of oars was pro- pelled with pieces of bark. McQuerry finally settled near Troy, Ohio, where he married a free colored woman and became the father of several children. Being industrious and of a fine char- acter, he soon gained a very respectable position among the neighbors, but a white man whose name should be handed down to eternal shame, John Russel, who lived not far from Piqua, having learned that McQuerry was a fugitive, in the hopes of obtaining a reward sent informa- tion to the master as to the whereabouts of the slave. McQuerry was arrested by Deputy- Marshal Trader while working on a canal boat and was brought in irons to the Galt House in Cincinnati. Peter II. Clark, the well known col- ored citizen, made application for a writ of habeas corpus at about two o'clock in the morn- ing to Justice MeLean in Clifton, about three miles from the city, asking that McQuerry be brought before the latter. The writ was granted and made returnable about ten o'clock in the morning. In the meantime Miller, the claimant, had made application to the United States Com- missioner S. S. Carpenter who fixed the hearing at seven o'clock in the morning. MeQuerry was brought before the commissioner in irons, which Carpenter at once ordered off. A continuance was had until two o'clock and the fugitive was ordered to be kept in the custody of the marshal. At ten o'clock Justice McLean found that the writ had been directed to the wrong deputy and that the fugitive had been brought before the commissioner, whereupon the matter was re- ferred to the commissioner. As this was the first case under the law the latter preferred that the licaring should be hield before Justice McLean and at two o'clock McQuerry was brought in by Marshals Black and Trader. The court room was crowded to the doors with both whites and blacks, and the jury box was filled with ladies. The mayor of the city, David T. Snelbaker, was present and, as much feeling had been shown both by the colored and white people, he had placed large numbers of police in the neighbor- hood of the Court House. The claimant was represented by T. C. Ware and McQuerry by John Jolliffe and Birney. There was little dis- pute as to the facts. It was proved beyond ques- tion that McQuerry was a fugitive slave be-
longing to Miller and the defense unfortunately had but little legal ground to stand on. Mr. Jolliffe delivered a long and impassioned argu- ment upon the iniquity of the process by which an intelligent and upright human being who had lived for four years a sober, industrious and re- spected citizen of the State of Ohio could be dragged from his home and the wife of his bosom, from the graves of his children and bound hand and foot, hurried forever away from them and from all that he held dear into a bondage by the side of which Egyptian thraldom was a mercy. He took the position that the Fugitive Slave Law was unconstitutional and void, partic- ularly in the denial of trial by right of jury. Dr. Brisbane of South Carolina was also per- mitted to make an argument for the fugitive and the court adjourned to hear the argument of Mr. Birney on the following morning. The prisoner was returned to the jail surrounded by a strong guard of police. Some demonstrations were made by the colored people but they were checked by the authorities. In the morning Bir- ney also made an argument, which was followed by Ware for the claimant. Justice McLean, after reviewing the evidence and the law, was obliged to announce that sympathy could cut no figure in his decision and following the strict letter of the law he remanded the fugitive to his master. Jolliffe moved for a writ of certiorari to the Supreme Court. Mel.ean reminded him that no appeal lay from the decision of a justice of the Supreme Court made in chambers and at his sug- gestion the claimant entered into a bond for $2,000 conditioned upon returning the slave to this State in case it was found that the case could be taken to the Supreme Court. McQuerry was at once turned over to Miller by the marshal and taken over to Covington on his way back to slavery. An effort was made to purchase the slave from his master, who was willing to sell him, but enough money could not be raised and McQuerry disappeared from history into the darkness of Southern slavedom.
A HEARING BEFORE COMMISSIONER CARPENTER.
Another fugitive slave case was heard by Com- missioner S. S. Carpenter in October, 1853. In this case the slave had escaped from Kentucky to Columbus and was brought back by the mar- shal to Cincinnati on the way back to slavery. John Jolliffe was assisted by Rutherford B. llayes in defending this fugitive. The defense was that on a former occasion the slave had been brought by his master into the State and that
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under the law of Ohio this voluntary act of the master freed the slave. The trial lasted for sev- eral days and at the conclusion of the evidence and the arguments Commissioner Carpenter de- ferred judgment until the next day at two o'clock. When the time came for the decision, the court, which was being held in the second story of Wil- son's Building on Court street on account of the building of the new Court House, was crowded with interested listeners both black and white. Mr. Carpenter was quite slow in reviewing the evidence and spoke in a low tone which necessi- tated most rapt attention on the part of the audi- ruce. The slave sat between his master and the marshal of Columbus and behind him were a number of white people, many of whom were abolitionists, and as he was a little crowded he slipped his chair back a little way to gain more room. As he was not noticed by any one he slipped it back again ; as he still was unnoticed he rose quietly to his feet and took a step backward. A friend put a good hat on his head and he moved cautiously toward a part of the room where the colored people were gathered. A num- ber of the abolitionists watched his every move- ment with anxious fear lest he should be dis- covered. At the door a passageway was made for him and he passed into the street, through an alley, crossed the canal through the German settlement and stole by an indirect route to Avon- dale, where he knew the sexton of the colored burying ground. His absence was not discovered for some minutes. Of course it created a great sensation and a search was immediately insti- tuted. The reading of the commissioner's opin- ion was immediately suspended and as the slave was never captured it was never concluded. Coffin and others disguised him in woman's ap- parel and brought him into the city. They lo- cated him in a house on Broadway near Sixth, where lic remained about a week. One Sunday evening he walked up Broadway to Eighth street, whence he followed Coffin through the throng to Vine. Here he was concealed in the basement of the Congregational Church and after a long time sent to Canada. This case excited a good deal of sarcastic comment, particularly as it be- came known that he had been aided by the church people. Mr. Coffin said that Carpenter afterwards told him that he expected to decide that the Fugitive Slave Law conferred on him, as commissioner, judicial powers which he could not constitutionally exercise. Carpenter, who was for many years one of the most respected mem- bers of our bar, resigned from office in Junte
of the following year, at which time he gave to the public press a lengthy statement of his reasons.
THE ROSETTA CASE.
Another celebrated case under the Fugitive Slave Law was the Rosetta case. Rosetta Arm- stead, a light mulatto girl of 16, belonged to Rev. Henry Dennison of Louisville. She was sent "by her master in care of a man named Miller to take her back to Wheeling, where the family had formerly lived. Miller started by river but by reason of the heavy ice was obliged to leave the boat at. Cincinnati. He concluded to visit some friends in Columbus and took Rosetta with him to that city. By this act Miller as agent of her master had under the law of Ohio emanci- pated her. Some colored people in Columbus interested themselves and she was taken before the Probate Court of Columbus, Ohio, on a writ of habeas corpus. Here she was declared free and the court appointed a guardian for her. Shortly afterwards her former owner appeared in the city and called upon her at the house of her guardian, where he endeavored to induce her to return to Kentucky with him. She refused, however, and thereupon he applied to Commis- sioner Pendery at Cincinnati, who issued a writ under which she was brought to this city. Here on another writ of habeas corpus she was brought before Judge Carter, who again held that she was free and that the marshal had no right to hold her in custody. In this matter she was repre- sented by Rutherford B. Hayes and Salmon P. Chase. At the suggestion of Chase, the court directed the sheriff to deliver her to her guardian at the Woodruff House, which he did. Immedi- ately upon her release by the sheriff, United States Marshal Robinson rcarrested her on Com- missioner Pendery's warrant and thereupon Judge Carter issued a citation against the mar- shal for contempt. She was taken before Pen- dery, where Flamen Ball argued the matter for her. He claimed that she had been brought into the State by Miller's agent and she was therefore entitled to freedom and had been pro- nounced free by two of the State courts. The claimants insisted that the State courts had 110 jurisdiction and that she must be held by the Fed- eral Court under the Fugitive Slave Law. Ro- setta's counsel argued that that law referred only to slaves who had escaped from a Slave State to a Free State, which was not the case of Rosetta. The decision was deferred from Saturday until Tuesday, during which time Rosetta was kept
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in the county jail. On Tuesday, Commissioner Pendery decided that the slave owner was bound by the act of his agent and that there had been no escape by Rosetta but an emancipation and amidst the hearty applause of the audience 'she was declared free and allowed to go back to her guardian at Columbus.
In a test case made of the conflict between the State and the Federal courts, Justice McLean. held that the machinery of the Fugitive Slave Law could not be interferred with by a State Court. This case was an episode of Marchi, 1855.
THE MARGARET GARNER CASE.
The most remarkable case tried under the Fugitive Slave Law and one which aroused the interest of the entire country was that of Mar- garet Garner in the latter part of January, 1856. At this time the Ohio River was frozen over and a party of 17 slaves escaped from Kentucky by crossing the ice just below Western row (now Central avenue). When they reached the shore on this side, they separated and eight of them belonging to the same family made their way to the house of a free colored man named Kite below Mill creek. They were obliged to make inquiries to find his house and these in- quiries subsequently led to their discovery. There were in this party an old man named Simon and his wife Mary, their son Robert and his wife Margaret Garner and four young children. Kite went up to the city to see Coffin, who at that time had his store at Sixth and Elm. Coffin told him that they were in an unsafe place and advised him to move them to the colored settle- ment farther up Mill creek. It was too late, however, for shortly after Kite's return the house was surrounded by the pursuers, a large number of officers, the masters and a posse of men. The escaped slaves prepared to battle for freedom and barred the windows and doors, refusing ad- mittance to the officers of the law. Margaret particularly declared that she would kill herself and children before being taken back to slavery. The men fought desperately but the window was finally battered down and the pursuers rushed in, to be greeted by a volley of shots, one of which put one of the deputy marshals out of the fight and another of which struck a police officer. Margaret's husband was soon overpowered and dragged from the house. At this moment Mar-
garet, seeing that resistance had been in vain. seized a butcher knife and with one powerful stroke almost severed the head of her youngest child, a little girl whom she loved the best. She attempted to take the life of the others as well as her own, but was overpowered and carried off to jail. This tragic episode threw the whole city into a state of excitement and the trial which lasted two weeks was listened to by vast crowds of people. The daily papers of the time reported the testimony and arguments of counsel in full. In fact little else appeared but the account of this trial and that of the Filibusters which was going on about the same time before Justice McLean. In the trial before Commissioner Pen- dery, Colonel Chambers of Cincinnati and Wall and Tinnell of Covington appeared for the claim- ants, and John J. Jolliffe and James M. Getchell for the slaves. The defense was on the ground that Margaret Garner had been brought by her owners years before into the State of Ohio to act as a nurse girl and hence by that act had been freed. It followed, of course, that if she was free her children, all of whom had been born before that time, were also free. Jol- liffe also attempted to procure their freedom by obtaining an indictment for murder against Mar- garet as a principal and the rest of the party as accessories and attempted to have them arrested at once on this charge. The fugitives he said had assured him that they would all "go sing- ing to the gallows" rather than be returned to slavery. The reason why he was anxious to have this writ served at once was that the Fugi- tive Slave Law provided that no warrant could be served on them after they should have been returned to bondage. He also argued the un- constitutionality of the act, but the commissioner was obliged to remand the fugitives back to slavery. He held that had Margaret asserted her freedom upon the occasion of hier former visit to the State she would have been free, as in allowing them to come to Ohio the master had voluntarily abandoned his claim upon them, but that she by returning had abandoned her clain to freedom. Jolliffe insisted that even a savage tribe reserved to itself the right to try a charge of murder committed within its border. Archi- bald Gaines, the owner of Margaret, agreed to have her in safe-keeping to be delivered up to the State of Ohio if the murder charge was
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pressed. The fugitives were delivered to their owners and taken in an omnibus to the wharf of the Covington ferry boat followed by an enor- mous crowd composed of sympathizers with the slaves and many Kentuckians who were inter- ested on behalf of the Gaines family. Gaines kept the slaves for a few days in Covington, but when the requisition was made for Margaret she was not to be found as he had sent her down the river. It is said that during her trip down the river she sprang from the boat into the water with her babe in her arms but as she came to the top she was rescued by the boat hands, although the child was drowned. She disap- peared in what her counsel called the "seething hell of American slavery."
This trial excited, as has been said, much at- tention and many prominent citizens attended the hearings. Margaret Garner was a mulatto about five feet high, showing about one-fourth white blood. The upper part of her face was that of an intelligent person, but her nose and lips were decidedly those of an African. She was 22 or 23 years of age and during the entire trial held in her arms her nine-months baby, which looked like herself. The other two children, little boys four and six years old, played about the mother's feet during the entire proceedings. The mur- dered child was said to have been almost white and of rather remarkable beauty. Margaret, throughout the trial, insisted that there would be no alternative for her but freedom or death, a sad commentary on the treatment she had re- ceived from her aristocratic owners. The other slaves seemed reconciled to slavery rather than death.
Among those who visited Margaret while she was in prison was Lucy Stone and it is said that she gave Margaret a knife with which to kill herself and her child in case of an adverse de- cision. Colonel Chambers, counsel for the claim- ant, referred to this in court and Lucy Stone, subsequently hearing of it, addressed the crowd in the court room after the adjournment. The peculiar case of the ignorant colored woman, through her acts showing the unconquerable force of a great despair, impressed her most deeply and she likened her spirit to that of the heroes of Bunker Hill.
An episode of the trial, which was recounted in all the, newspapers and which afterwards was
narrated by Mr. Coffin in his book, relates to the conduct of a deputy marshal who, ignorant of the habits of the Quakers, insisted upon the re- moval of Coffin's hat. As Coffin refused to re- move his hat, the Kentucky marshal took it off for him but to his dismay Coffin would not ac- cept it when he attempted to hand it to him. The marshal was somewhat discouraged. at this and finally relieved himself of the hat by placing it upon a table in the corner. A friendly police- man returned it to Mr. Coffin, who again put it on his head. This put the obstreperous marshal into a dilemma in which his dignity was in- volved. Ile once more pulled off the hat, but was thereupon interrupted by a policeman who took the hat from him and placed it back on Coffin's head.
This story told about the city induced another well known citizen, Jonathan Cable, a Presby- terian minister from College Hill, to wear his hat in the court room. The marshal repeated his performance of taking off the hat, but upon offering it to Cable he was instructed that as he was United States marshal and as such a servant of the people, lie should hold Cable's hat for him until the latter wanted it. The perplexed marshal, realizing that the whole town had by this time begun to ridicule him, did hold the hat until adjournment. This little incident served to inflame the feeling of the public against the iniquitous law and Cincinnati, which had been for so long a time rather pro-slavery in its senti- ments, was experiencing a very decided change of conviction produced by such insults as those of the confident slave owners and their officious assistants. Another ground for resentment was based upon the fact that when Governor Chase on March 4th sent a requisition to the Governor of Kentucky asking for the return of the mnr- derers on the ground that slaves could not be permitted to cross the river into Ohio and there commit crimes of impunity, it was found that Margaret had been sent down the river.
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