USA > Pennsylvania > Perry County > History of Perry County, Pennsylvania, including descriptions of Indians and pioneer life from the time of earliest settlement, sketches of its noted men and women and many professional men > Part 66
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THOMAS R. MARSHALL, Ex-Vice President of the United States, Whose Mother Was Born at Ickesburg, Perry County.
to labor as has been the case with so many men who became suc- cessful. He was graduated from Wabash College at Crawfords- ville, achieving a reputation for scholarship which still stands first at that institution. Through excellence in his studies, by which one becomes eligible to the Phi Beta Kappa fraternity, he was elected to
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membership. That fraternity, by the way, was founded by Chief Justice Marshall. Mr. Marshall took up the study of law at Fort Wayne, and on his twenty-first birthday was admitted to the bar. Ile located at Columbia City, Indiana, and in a short time was known all over northern Indiana. In a few years he was known over the entire state, as one of its most able attorneys. Then came his entry into matrimony. While acting as a special judge in the circuit court at Angola, Indiana, he met Miss Lois Kinsey, who was assisting her father, the court clerk, and later she became Mrs. Marshall.
In 1908 the Democrats of Indiana were in a quandary as to whom to nominate for the governorship. Some person suggested that they name some prominent lawyer. He had not been a can- didate, yet "Tom" Marshall was the one man to whom all turned. and he was nominated. He took the stump and with him went Mrs. Marshall, who was of great assistance to him. As governor of Indiana Mr. Marshall showed himself to be opposed to the cen- tralization of government. He is a Democrat of the old school. When he was elected governor he carried the state by 15,000 ma- jority, while the Democratie candidate for President lost it by 10,000. Indiana thought so much of him that he was their first choice for President at the Baltimore convention, which accorded him second place on the ticket. His election then, and nomination and reelection four years later are matters of history, with which all are familiar.
Throughout both terms of his service Vice-President Marshall was a prudent, self-determined, open-minded man, with a lofty purpose which commanded the respect and admiration of the Sen- ate, of all branches of the Federal government, and of the nation. On his retirement Senator Lodge and Senator Underwood, repre- senting two different political faiths, paid him a most remarkable tribute. Mr. Marshall filled the Vice-Presidency with an unusual dignity at a most trying time.
ALEXANDER H. STEPHENS, VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE CONFEDERATE STATES.
That the second highest officer of the Confederate States of America, the section which seceded from the Union in 1861, was a descendant of a family from Perry County, that staunch and loyal district which stood with Lincoln throughout the war, seems strange indeed, yet it is true, Alexander H. Stephens on the pater- nal side being a descendant of the Baskins family, one of the pio- neer families of the county, and his own father having been born near Duncannon. And furthermore, Mr. Stephens was not igno- · rant of the fact of his Northern ancestry, but on one occasion came North to visit his relatives near Newport, traveling by packet boat,
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via the canal, and stopping with James Black, at Newport, whose acquaintance he had made while in Congress.
An anecdote of this trip appears in the Life of Alexander H. Stephens, by Johnston, and shows that James Stephens, like his brother Andrew, was a man of high principle. It follows:
ALEXANDER H. STEPHENS,
Vice President of the Southern Confederacy During its Existence, Whose Father was Born at Duncannon.
"On his journey to New York he turned aside to visit his old uncle, James Stephens, who lived in Perry County, Pennsylvania, near the mouth of the Juniata. The family, who had heard nothing of his coming, were at once surprised and gratified at seeing him. The uncle and some of the boys were out at work on the farm, but soon came in, and then an older brother's family were sent for. The aunt and the girls at once set about getting up a good country dinner in honor of the occasion. When all were seated at the table, the old uncle at one end and the aunt at the other,
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Uncle James asked, 'Well, Alexander, what business are you pursuing ?' He replied, 'I am a lawyer.' Instantly the whole table was silent. The old gentleman threw down his knife and fork and looked at his nephew with a sort of horrified amazement, as if he had said he was a highway- man or a pirate. 'What's the matter, Uncle James?' 'Did you say you were a lawyer?' 'Yes' 'A lawyer?' 'What of that?' With an expression of complete despair he asked, 'Alexander, don't you have to tell lies?' His nephew, greatly amused, replied, 'No, sir; the business of a lawyer is neither to tell lies nor to defend lies, but to protect and maintain right. truth, and justice ; to defend the weak against the strong; to expose fraud, perjuries, lies, and wrongs of all sorts. The business of a lawyer is the highest and noblest of any on earth connected with the duties of life.' This seemed to calm the old gentleman's fears."
The story of the meeting of the winsome Catherine Baskins and Alexander Stephens, the elder, and the grandfather of the Vice-President, reads like fiction. He came to Pennsylvania in 1746. He was a soldier under Braddock, had settled near James Baskins, in 1766, and, while crossing the Baskins' ferry at the mouth of the Juniata, got a glimpse of the ferryman's fair daughter and became infatuated. When military duty no longer claimed his attention he came back and again resided near the Baskins' ferry. He wooed and won the fair maiden and tradition says "not with the consent of her father, who refused to sanction the marriage and who disinherited her for that reason." And here is where tradition is at least partly wrong. The will of James Baskins, of Rye Township, dated January 30, 1788, recorded at the Carlisle Courthouse in Book E, page 117, and proven February 11, 1788, gives "five pounds" to each of his daughters, Elizabeth MeCay, Catherine Stephens, Sarah Dougherty; and Jane Jones. The resi- clue of his estate he willed to his son, Mitchell Baskins. His exec- utors were Frederick and David Watts and Mitchell Baskins. The inventory, included ferrying flat, canoe, etc. The will shows that Catherine was treated in the same identical way as were her sis- ters, notwithstanding that all biographical works state otherwise. The reason for the nominal bequests to the daughters was prob- ably due to the fact that they were all married and well cared for. Furthermore, James Baskins was not a wealthy man in the gen- eral acceptation of that term. Nevertheless, the young people were wed and located about five miles up the river.
In the meantime the Revolution came on apace and Stephens be- came a captain in the Continental Army, serving throughout the war. When the war was over he came back and with his wife set- tled in the vicinity of Duncannon, where in 1782, Andrew Baskins Stephens, the father of Alexander H. Stephens, was born. The Stephens family moved to Georgia in 1794, when Andrew was twelve years old; another son, James Stephens, going along, but later returning to Perry County and settling in Juniata Township, where he owned three hundred acres of land in 1820, the year of
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HISTORY OF PERRY COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA
Perry County's organization. There was a considerable migration to Georgia about this time by Scotch-Irish Presbyterians from Cumberland County, owing to the State of Georgia adopting a land policy which offered free homes to settlers.
Andrew Stephens married Margaret Grier, of Wilkes County, Georgia, July 12, 1806, and from this union of Puritan and Cava- lier, was born Alexander H. Stephens, later Vice-President of the Confederate States, statesman, Congressman, and Governor of Georgia. Andrew Baskins Stephens, whether or not timid about getting parental sanction for the marriage, on May 17, of that year, made his request to her father for her hand, in writing, a single sentence stating, "The use of this written communication does not wholly originate in pusilanimity or in other sources that may be deemed timid, but in the intention to afford you requisite intelligence ; and thereby to furnish you matter sufficient for abso- lute conclusion." In a further sealed enclosure, only to be opened in case his suit was looked upon favorably, he goes into details as to his birthplace, family, prospects, etc., a part of which follows and inseparably connects his parentage with Perry County :
"I was born in the State of Pennsylvania, in Cumberland County (in the part which is now Perry), in the year 1782, of poor parentage; by father's side particularly on account of my grandmother being a widow. Whether necessity, or the idea of promotion, or the tyranny of a domineering step- father, induced my father at an early age to become a resident among the northern Shawnee Indians, I cannot tell, but he passed a considerable part of his youth with that copper-faced tribe; insomuch that his fortunes and accomplishments were by no means accepted by my mother's family. However, by an unwearied diligence he surmounted many inconveniences and became rather respected in the American Revolution. His manner of life since my remembrance has been regular and not uneconomical. He is now on the borders of eighty and possessed of more sprightliness than many of fifty. My mother was the eldest daughter of James Baskins, who in his life, kept a ferry above Harris's on the Susquehanna River. Her life was exemplary, and the Christian manner of her death a joy to every dutiful child that survived her. She had ten children, two of whom died at an early age; the others are widely scattered. My older sister and iny- self (the oldest and the youngest) with our father are the only remains of a once flourishing family. One sister, within three miles of us, is the only other known relative I have in the state. I never heard of felony being committed by any of my relations, but a considerable degree of dis- sipation. And as to achievements, I always leave them to be spoken of by better judges than myself."
Mr. Grier gave his consent, with the added rejoinder, that "the sentiments of her mother are such that she has no objection to offer, but that she is unfriendly to long courtships."
Andrew Stephens had a strong desire to again visit his Northern relatives, and did so in 1813, writing a letter to his sister from "Penton, Penna .. " under date of April 28th. In it among other things he says: "I am now under old Cousin Hugh Stephens' roof.
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The Monday just two weeks after I left home I slept in Pennsylvania. * * * Brother (James Stephens) has a pretty promising family and a wife inferior to none. Indeed, Polly, I can and do call her sister. * 1 left brother's yesterday morn- ing ; on my way here I saw Aunt Baskins, Uncle Mitchell's widow, and family, who are living about two miles from grandfather's old ferry. Aunt was very glad to see me and appeared to live com- fortably well. I love her mightily. She told me that uncle had entirely quit the use of spirits several years before his death. * * * Saw Cousin Hezekiah Martin." The letter is of much length, and of a personal nature.
Andrew Baskins Stephens, like his father, Capt. Alexander Stephens, was a learned man and a school teacher. The author has had the privilege of reading many of their personal and family let- ters and they show not only the earmarks of intelligence, but throughout are marked for their moral and even religious teach- ings. From a letter dated Wilkes County, Georgia, May 4, 1823. from Andrew B. Stephens, to his brother, James Stephens, in Perry County, the following paragraph is taken :
"When we hear of your children we want to hear that they are prom- ising ; we want and wish them to be so. We want and wish them to be patterns of obedience particularly to their mother, industrious and candid, ever scorning a mean or ungenerous act; striving as much as in them lieth to be peaceable, friendly and obliging, never fretting and finding faults of others to the neglect of their own, but by the faults of others correct their own; by so doing and living in obedience to the commands and precepts of their parents and senior superiors they will become honorable to them- selves, useful to society, and a pleasing prospect to their friends and rela- tions in every corner of the world."
The following is from Howard Carroll's "Twelve Americans":
"His grandfather, Alexander Stephens, was one of the Jacobites, who fled from England to America after the disastrous sequel to the ill-starred attempt of 'the Forty-Five.' Filled with a spirit of adventure, young and strong, he at first made his home with the Shawnee Indians in Pennsyl- vania. He took part in the French and Indian War, serving under Wash- ington, and was present at Braddock's defeat. Subsequently in his wan- derings he came to the ferry at the junction of the Juniata and Susque- hanna Rivers, and there fell in love with the daughter of the ferry pro- prietor, a rich man named Boskins (Baskins). The maid looked favorably upon the young adventurer's suit; but the rich father, as rich fathers will, objected. Still the love-making went on, and in the end the young people, braving the father's displeasure, were married. The latter, true to his threat, disinherited her. Some time after this, the war for Independence having been declared, Stephens took service with the patriots. He was a good soldier and at the close of hostilities returned with the rank of cap- tain. Unfortunately his estate was not in keeping with his rank, and to better his fortune he moved from Pennsylvania to Georgia."
That Alexander H. Stephens, the grandson, whose father was a native of Perry County territory, was a gifted man, a man of let- ters, a statesman and an historic personage, is verified by the fact
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that in the Library of the City of New York the author of this book found access to no less than forty-two distinct volumes de- voted to or written by him. He was born in Wilkes County, Georgia (in the part that is now Taliaferro County), on February 11, 1812. His mother died when he was a mere child and his fa- ther married again, the noted Linton Stephens being a child of this second marriage. He was interested in securing an education through the Presbyterian Church, which looked upon him favor- ably for the ministry, and provided means. He taught school for a time and then read law and was admitted to the bar of his na- tive county. He was offered a large salary to locate elsewhere, but preferred to practice among his own people for a few hundred dollars a year. He entered Franklin College (now the State Uni- versity) in 1828, at the age of sixteen. He graduated with the highest honors in 1832, as did his brother, Judge Linton Stephens, at a later period. He was admitted to the bar in 1834. In 1836 he was elected to the lower branch of the Georgia Legislature, and was later promoted to the State Senate. He was elected to the United States Congress as a Whig in 1843, and served from the Twenty-Ninth to the Thirty-Fifth Congresses, inclusive, and from the Forty-Third to the Forty-Seventh Congresses, inclusive, retir- ing voluntarily in 1859. When the Sectional War was over he was elected to the United States Senate by the State of Georgia in 1866, but was not seated, as all of the disaffected section had not yet been restored to the Union.
IInman nature is interspersed with contradictions, which lend charm to life, and this man, Alexander H. Stephens-his physical appearance, his character and his career-is a study in that line. While he was almost an invalid all of his busy life, yet, like Theo- dore Roosevelt, who was a delicate lad, he neither accepted that condition of things or submitted to it. We quote from Gamaliel Bradford's "Confederate Portraits": "Such a wretched frame for such a fierce vitality might easily have made another Leopardi, veiling all the light of heaven in black pessimism, cursing man and nature and God with cold irony for the vile mistake of his creation. Stephens fights his ills, makes head against them, never lets him- self be really prostrated by physical torture or mental agony." He once wrote, in a fit of despondence, "I have in my life been one of the most miserable beings that walked the earth," and yet he rose to eminence and to fame.
No man was more bitterly opposed to secession and to war than he was. ITistory records few finer things than Stephens' manly stand against the tide of secession in his state, and certainly no Southerner made a harder or more nearly successful fight to pre- vent the withdrawal of his state from the Union. When he deliv- ered his famous anti-secession speech his friend, Robert Toombs,
PERRY COUNTY'S NOTEL .N 619
although opposed to it, heartily applauded. When criticized for the action, he replied. "I always try to behave myself at a funeral." On one occasion he remarked. "I believe the state will go for secession, but I have a repugnance to the idea." Yet when Georgia did secede it was either necessary for him to go along with the tide or leave his home and state, an outcast from among his people. His view was that Georgia was his home and his state, and his allegiance was to Georgia. If Georgia remained in the Union then his allegiance was to the Union through his citizenship in Georgia. but when Georgia seceded then his citizenship likewise automatically removed him from the Union. Like Lee, Stephens went with his state; like Lee, he had opposed secession to the last, and like F,ce. he became one of the really big men of the Confederacy. In fact, there were but three men considered at all for the Presidency of the seceded states, and Alexander H. Stephens was one. He was not chosen to that office but was made Vice-President of them on February 9. 1861, and championed the cause of the Confederacy. and yet he persistently opposed the conduct of that government from the beginning to the end. He opposed Davis on the impor- tant matters of finance and cotton and was opposed to conscription and martial law. He closed some rather severe remarks about President Davis thus: "It is certainly not my object to detract from Mr. Davis, but the truth is that as a statesman he was not colossal." After the government was organized at Montgomery it was reported that Davis said it was "now a question of brains," on which Stephens commented. "I thought the remark a very good one."
While in Congress he advocated the annexation of Texas but opposed that of Mexico. He ardently supported the compromise measures of 1850 and advocated the passage of the Kansas- Nebraska bill. He was Vice-President of the Confederacy until it fell. He was the South's representative to the conference with Lincoln and Seward at Hampton Roads on February 3. 1865. to consider terms of peace. A little incident of the Hampton Roads Conference shows the bigness of Mr. Lincoln. When the confer- ence was over that had resulted in nothing. Lincoln and Stephens renewed a personal friendship that had begun in Congress before the war. After discussing many things, and just as they . were parting Mr. Lincoln said, "Well, Stephens, is there anything of a personal nature I can do for you?" Mr. Stephens said, "Mr. 1.in- coln, I have a nephew who is a prisoner at Johnson's Island and we have heard nothing from him in a long time, and if you can do anything for him I shall appreciate it." Mr. Lincoln immedi- ately was interested, wanted to know his name, etc., and took the information down in a note book which he carried, telling Mr. Stephens he would do what he could.
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HISTORY OF PERRY COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA
On February 5, 1865, Lieut. John A. Stephens, a Confederate prisoner at Johnson's Island, was ordered to report to headquar- ters. There he was told to pack up what he had and be ready at once to go to Washington, that orders had come that morning for him to be sent to the President of the United States. Young Stephens was dumbfounded, for he could not imagine why he should be ordered to Washington, unless it was to be tried, hung or something of an awful nature. But bidding his friends good- bye, he reported for the trip. It was a bitter cold day and he was driven across Lake Erie in a sleigh drawn by two mules. Reach- ing Sandusky he took the train and made his way to Washington. Upon reaching the Union capital he made his way at once to the White House to see the President. He sent in his name on a slip of paper, and after waiting some time was finally ushered into an inner office into the presence of Abraham Lincoln.
Mr. Lincoln was lying at full length upon an office table talking to Mr. Seward. Secretary of State, when Lieut. Stephens went in. Hle immediately got up and took both of Stephens' hands, giving him a very cordial welcome, and introducing him to Mr. Seward. He told him that he had seen his uncle at Hampton Roads and that he was well and that Mr. Stephens had asked him to send him to him and that he was going to do so. He told him to have the free- dom of Washington as long as he wanted it and that when he got ready to go South to come to him and that he would give him his passes through the Union lines.
Young Stephens stayed in Washington several days and then re- ported to Mr. Lincoln to get his papers and to say good-bye. Mr. Lincoln turned to his desk and penned the following letter :
EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, D. C .. February 10, 1865.
HON. ALEXANDER H. STEPHENS.
Crawfordville, Ga.
My Dear Sir: According to our agreement your nephew. Lieut. Stephens, goes to you bearing this note. Please in return to select and send to me that officer of the same rank imprisoned at Richmond whose physical con- dition most urgently requires his release. Respectfully,
A. LINCOLN.
Young Stephens was passed through the Union lines, joined the Confederate Army once more and, after the surrender, made his way to Georgia. When the letter from Mr. Lincoln was delivered to Mr. Stephens, Mr. Lincoln had been dead for some time.
Before the secession Mr. Stephens argued for the abolition of his own seat in Congress. He told the South that their agitators had done more than anything else to bring on the war. He wrote : "If they (the secession leaders) without cause destroy the present government, the best government in the world, what hope would I have that they would not bring untold hardships upon the people
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in their efforts to give us one of their own modeling." At the same time he was an ardent advocate of slavery, believing that slavery presented the most satisfactory solution of the difficult relations between whites and blacks, and that it was the duty of the superior race to protect and care for the inferior. Of all the eulogies of Stephens that of Abraham Lincoln is reproduced here as the most impressive. He wrote: "I just take up my pen to say that Mr. Stephens, of Georgia, a little, slim, pale-faced, consumptive man, has just concluded the very best speech of an hour's length I have ever heard. My old withered dry eyes are full of tears yet." Again we quote from Bradford's "Confederate Portraits": "He was probably one of the most logical, clear-headed, determined de- fenders of slavery and of the thorough subordination of black to white, yet few men have been more sensitively humane, more ten- derly sympathetic with suffering in either white or black. The negroes loved him, and on one occasion after the war three thou- sand freedmen gathered on his lawn and serenaded him with pas- sionate admiration and devotion." The eulogy of a slave would well serve for an epitaph for Stephens. It was: "Mars' Alex is kind to folks that nobody else will be kind to; he is kinder to dogs than mos' folks is to folks." Immediately after the war he was imprisoned as a secessionist in Fort Warren, at Boston, for six months, and from his diary we glean: "How strange it seems to me that I should thus suffer, I who did everything in my power to prevent (the war). On the fourth of September, 1848, I was near losing my life for resenting the charge of being a traitor to the South, and now I am here, a prisoner under charge, I suppose, of being a traitor to the Union. In all, I have done nothing but what I thought was right."
There is a letter in existence in which Stephens discusses the possibilities, if the Confederate Government should fall upon his shoulders, in the event of the death of Davis. In it the clear ap- preciation of the abstract end to be attained is no finer than the full recognition of the immense difficulties and what he terms his . own unfitness to encounter them.
Alexander Stephens never married, yet he loved children. He ·had two love affairs. The first he passed owing to poverty and ill- health. In the second instance he was already in Congress and well-to-do. The lady was not unwilling, but he took the lonesome way, claiming that a woman's due is a husband to lean upon in- stead of one whom she must nurse. He helped educate many young men. Cheerfulness, kindliness and sympathy won for him hosts of friends, as they will for any who practice them. In col- lege, though poor, he was generally beloved. Of his official life in Washington it was the same. John Quincy Adams is said to have greeted him with verses more notable for feeling than for
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