USA > South Carolina > Biographical sketches of the bench and bar of South Carolina, vol. II > Part 25
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Dr. Laborde's description of his person and character as a scholar and lawyer, was, I have no doubt, derived from Mr. Hanford's brother-in-law, my much-respected friend and brother Judge, Evans, and therefore I adopt it as the best which can he had.
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MEMBERS OF THE BAR.
JOHN LYDE WILSON.
This extraordinary man was born in Marlborough District, South Carolina, on the 24th of May, 1784. He received a good academic education, and studied law with Judge Chase, in the City of Baltimore, for more than three, and probably for four years, as that was the term of study required at the pe- riod of his admission to the Bar, which took place at Colum- bia, in 1807.
He settled in Georgetown, and married the daughter of Col. William Alston, and the sister of Gov. Joseph Alston, by whom he had two children, daughters. His wife died early ; her children were raised by her sister, Lady Nesbitt. He was first returned to the House of Representatives in the General As- sembly of South Carolina, from Prince George Winyaw, in 1808.
I first saw him, so that I remembered him, in November, 1812. He was then Chairman of the Committee of Privileges and Elections in the House. The seat of Thomas Rothmaler Mitchell, Esq .- returned as a Member from Prince George Winyaw-was contested by Benjamin Huger, Esq. I heard the contest. Mr. Huger stated one of his objections to be, that three votes were found in the box, in several instances, cut apart and rolled up in one ; these he called "sows and pigs." This singular expression fixed the matter upon my mind. The protest was sustained, and the seat of the sitting member vacated. From that period I knew Mr. Wilson as a Member of the House of Representatives, and afterwards as Senator from Prince George Winyaw. In 1822, he was elected President of the Senate, and in the course of the session he was elected Governor and Commander-in-chief.
In 1822, before his election as Governor, he had published a severe review of the Court of Appeals, and a harsh criticism on Chancellor Waties' elaborate decree, in the case of Carr and Wife vs. Greene. This production, I have no doubt, con- tributed greatly to the overthrow of the Court of Appeals in Equity, in 1824.
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In 1822, I was invited to attend a friendly legal conference the house of my friend Col. Gregg, which was attended by at Gov. Wilson, Gov. Miller, Judge Evans, Judge Butler, and many other eminent lawyers. The project of a separate Court of Appeals as a necessary remedy for the supposed abuses and errors in Equity, was discussed, and my objec- tions met and removed, for from 1816, up to that time, I had been opposed to the proposed change. In 1824, I concurred fully, in the separate Court of Appeals, and I have ever since believed that it was and is better adapted to the proper administration of justice, than any other system, which ever has been tried, or can be suggested.
After Governor Wilson went out of office, he married a Miss Eden, of New York, (who was said to have been a ward of Colonel Burr,) by whom he had two children-daughters. His second wife preceded him to the tomb.
He was a member of the celebrated Nullification Conven- tion of 1832, and in the session of 1832 and 1833, advocated the most violent measures which were proposed.
I see it is stated in the annunciation of Major General Schnierle, that he was elected several times to the Legisla- ture, after the close of his term as Governor. I only recollect him as a Member of the Senate, at the trial of Judge James, in 1827-1828.
In 1838, he published "The Code of Honor," which he affirmed to be the means of saving life. If so, it deserves credit ; but if it be only rules for the regulation of private combats, called " duelling," then I cannot consider it of any value. For, as a friend who had been engaged in more than one duel, once said to me : "Dnelling is now deliberate murder, It is," said he, " no longer an affair of chivalry, in which there is an appeal to the god of battles, for victory to the right ; but now, the parties prepare to kill each other by superior skill in the use of the instrument of death. I will," said he, " have no more to do with it"-and he never did. Those were the sentiments of Matthew Irvine Keith, whose name is authority on such a subject, as that to which I have alluded.
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Governor Wilson's intellect was a fine one. His speeches, political and legal, were always compiled with wonderful arrangement and care. He possessed the art of putting his thoughts, in an extemporary speech, in the lucido ordine, so much commended by the ancients. His voice and manner were fine and graceful. If he had cultivated the great talents with which God had endowed him, he must have been among the greatest men of South Carolina.
General John Schnierle tells us, in the article to which I have already alluded : " his nature was above disguise, and his resentments, terrible in their outbreak, were ever under the control of a gentle and kindly nature." He had often the misfortune to be engaged in bitter feuds, which, more than once, were settled by an appeal to the field of honor, as it is falsely called.
There his coolness never deserted him, and he uniformly was the victor in such scenes.
Governor Wilson died in Charleston, on the 12th of February, 1849. Appropriate military honors were paid to his body, which was interred alongside of his second wife, in St. Paul's Church-yard. The evening of Governor Wilson's life, was a dark and gloomy one; it was, however, very much brightened by the attention of a brother lawyer, who never saw suffering without attempting to alleviate it.
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MEMBERS OF THE BAR.
BENJAMIN C. YANCEY.
Of this eminent gentleman, I have sought for information, and have not been fortunate enough to obtain much aid be- yond my own memory.
He was the son of James Yancey, Esq., who, as I think, lived in Laurens District, and was a County Court Lawyer, and possibly the County Attorney. One of my informants thinks he was born in Boston, another that he was born in Charleston. It is certain that his mother was a Cudworth, a lady of the lower country ; and that he was educated at the school of Dr. Pyles, Laurens District. James McKibbin, and John Caldwell were his schoolmates.
He was a midshipman on board the Constellation, under Commodore Truxton, and was present and bore a part in the engagement between her and the French frigates, L'Iusur- gente and La Vengeance-the former was captured, the latter escaped in the night after having struck her colors.
After peace with France, he resigned, studied law with Robert Goodloe Harper, Esq., in Baltimore, Maryland, and then came to Laurens and finished his studies with B. H. Saxon, Esq., and was admitted to the Bar, but when, I cannot say, for his name does not appear on the Charleston or Columbia Roll.
On the 8th December, 1808, he married Miss Caroline Bird, of Georgia, a daughter of Colonel William Bird, and the sis- ter of Mrs. Captain Robert Cunningham; he then settled at Abbeville. When I first saw Mr. Yancey, he was a Member of the Legislature, from Abbeville District, I think, in 1812. He was then remarkable for his talent, as a ready debater, and became the aid of Governor Alston, with the rank of Colonel.
Mr. Yancey was one of the Committee of Two, who ex- amined Mr. McDuffie and myself in the Court of Equity, at the Spring Term of 1814.
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In the summer and fall of 1814, I met Mr. Yancey, at Abbeville and Laurens as a Solicitor in Equity and an Attor- ney-at- law. From that time forward to his death I had fre- quent opportunities of knowing him.
In October, 1816, I was returned to the House of Represen- tatives, and there met Mr. Yancey as a Representative from Charleston. He had been a Member from Abbeville in 1810, '11, '12 and '13. He failed to be returned from Abbeville, in 1814, owing, it is said, to the ascendancy of the Calhoun and Noble parties, and, as I have heard, to some unpopularity connected with the cases arising out of Patrick Duncan's right to the large tract of land granted to Livingston and his associates, and of which Francis Salvador, at his death, was the owner, commonly called the Jews'-land cases .* removed to Charleston, was the partner of Judge Huger, and
He was rising rapidly to eminence at the Charleston Bar. He was the Chairman of the Judiciary Committee in 1816. In the business and debates of that Session in the House of Repre- sentatives he bore an active and useful part. In the summer of 1817, at the house of his friend, Col. Chistopher Breithaupt, in Edgefield District, on his way from Charleston, with his family, to visit his brother-in-law, Captain Cunningham, he sickened and died with yellow fever. He was about thirty- five years of age at his death. Mr. Yancey was eminent for his talents, legal acquirements, and unyielding firmness, He prepared his cases with great care ; he was anxious, and even timid, about his preparation, but when in Court, he seemed as if he never knew the word fear. His arguments were clear, forcible, and sometimes eloquent. Most generally he relied on argument, not eloquence. He sometimes indulged in a little sarcasm. Cases, which were considered almost desperate, were confided to his care, and he was often suc- cessful where failure was anticipated.
In the Jews'-land cases he visited Washington, and, before
* This gentleman was killed in an ambuscade of the Cherokees, whereby Wil- liamson was surprised in his attack about 2 A. M., of the 1st of August .- See second Drayton's Memoirs 345, '6, '7, 'S, '9.
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the Supreme Court, succeeded in defeating the Philadelphia Land Company, (perhaps called the North American Land Company,) which had succeeded on the circuit in recovering the land. He was the leading counsel in the case against Mitchupon for murder, which I stated in the sketch of Judge Brevard. He was concerned, at his death, for the plaintiff, in the case of "Duncan vs. The occupants of the Jews-land ;" and his executors, in the defence of a case brought by Duncan against them, were allowed, on a discount, a large fee for his services .- Duncan vs. the executors of Yancey, 1 McC. 449. This, although richly merited by Mr. Yancey, was a bad pre- cedent in a Court of Justice. It was the first instance of a fee recovered on a quantum non-suit, and has since led to the association of many such claims, often exorbitant, and which have very much detracted from the standing of my brethren who, like Cæsar's wife, ought to be above suspicion.
Mr. Yancey, I have already said, was a ready debater in the Legislature. He was not only that, but he was a most laborious and useful member. In 1816, the office of Chair- man of the Judiciary Committee was a post requiring un- ceasing vigilance and labor. It was his duty to see that the laws proposed were aptly prepared and judiciously conceived. He presided each night over the labors of his Committee, and next day presented the result of their labors in the various reports. Everything was pressed forward then to expedite the business of the usual short sessions of our Legislature. Mr. Yancey was never known to be behind, and he was always ready to run a tilt, or break a lance with any opponent to his views or reports.
Mr. Yancey was remarkable for his courage. He showed it in early youth, in the affair with the French frigate, and in all after-life. He was courteous, as brave; I never saw him rude in Court or in the Legislature. He died, as it were, in the morning of life, and the tears of the State were shed upon his early grave. He was mourned by his widow, and two sons, William L. Yancey, Esq., now of Montgomery, Ala- bama, and Benjamin C. Yancey, Esq., now the U. S. Minister to the Argentine Republic.
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MEMBERS OF THE BAR.
JOHN M. FELDER.
This gentleman was born about 1780 or 1781. He was a native of Orangeburgh District, South Carolina, and the eldest son of Samuel Felder, deceased. His grandfather came from Zurich, Switzerland, about 1720 or 1730, and settled in Orangeburgh District, on a plantation still in the possession of the family.
This gentleman was a very active partizan in the Revolu- tion. He brought his love of liberty from his native canton, and, like Tell, of his fatherland, he was willing to peril all, rather than submit to tyranny. He guided General Sumter in his approach to Orangeburgh, and bore a part in the cap- ture of that post.
At or about the close of the war, the Tories surrounded his house : the gallant Swiss, by the aid of his wife and servants, who loaded his guns while he fired, killed more than twenty of his foes. His house was at last fired, and he was thus forced to fly. In attempting to escape, he was shot, and killed.
Much of his ancestor's love of liberty and determined pur- pose of character descended to the subject of this sketch.
He graduated with distinction in 1804, at Yale College, with John C. Calhoun and Bishop Gadsden, and was regarded as the best mathematician of his class. He read hard, under the direction of Judge Gould, and attended the lectures of Morris and Gould, in their celebrated Law-School, at Litch- field, Connecticut.
He was admitted to the Bar at Columbia, in 1808. He was a Member of the House of Representatives of South Carolina in 1812. My recollection of Major Felder inclines me to think he was a Member in 1810 and 1811. He was, I see, a member of the Board of Trustees of the South Carolina Col- lege in 1812, and was not elected at the Quadrennial Election in 1813. This would not (I should think) have occurred, if
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he had then been a Member of the House; but I sec, from General Quattlebaum's remarks in the Senate, on moving re- solutions in relation to his death, that he was placed on an important Special Committee in the House of Representatives, " to consider the propriety of chartering a Bank of the State," in 1812. This, I presume, might have been, at the August Extra Session of 1812.
The Major, when a Member, was a young man who dressed well, and wore broadcloth, which was not then very common above tide-water. My recollection is, he spoke often in the House of Representatives, and not very acceptably. On one occasion he harangued the House at some length, on a sub- ject which I don't remember. It had the effect to empty the seats of many of the members. After making his speech he went into the lobby, where he met Henry Hampton, who was much of a wag. Felder said to him, " Henry, did you hear my speech ?" " Oh, yes, Major," was the reply. " What did you think of it?" " I thought," said Henry, " it was the most moving speech I ever heard ?"
He was, at this time, I presume from his title, a major in the line of the militia; at the close of the War of 1812, when the news of peace reached South Carolina, in Feb., 1815, he was on his way, at the head of a battalion from Orangeburgh, to assist in the defence of the seaboard.
Major Felder was, I presume, several times, between 1812 and 1830, a Member of the House of Representatives, though I have no recolletion of him as a Member but once, probably fromn 1822 to 1824.
In 1830 he was elected to Congress in the place of Judge Martin. For four years he was a Member. He then declined a re-election, and lived in retirement until 1840, when he was chosen Senator for Orange Parish, and continued in that office by successive elections until his death. A contributor to one of the papers in South Carolina, over the signature of " A Looker On," possibly in 1840, thus speaks of Major Felder, who had then lately come into the Senate. " He is a great acquisition to it. His manner is original in every respect ; he possesses a well-stored mind, but his mode of conveying
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his information is so perfectly unique, that his rising to speak is always a signal for something fresh and entertaining. It matters not how many have spoken on the subject, every one still wishes to hear Mr. Felder, because no one can say the samething, and look so earnestly as he. His reason- ing is generally correct, but it matters not how serious he is, he is always sure to convulse the Senate with laughter some dry expression or odd maxim he utters. As a poli- tician, he is, perhaps, too distrustful of men. He looks suspiciously on all legislation, and at present his chief politi- cal considerations are centered in the cause of agriculture. He seems to consider few men great or good who do not till the earth. With Cowley, he sees that God made Adam a gardener, Abel a grazier or shepherd, and Cain a plough- man ; and it was not until Cain became an artizan, or builder of cities, that he became a murderer. Mr. Felder sees a deep moral lesson in this piece of history, and upon it he seems to build his system of political economy.
" He is one of the strictest constructionists in the Senate The Constitution is his polar star. To step one inch beyond it is to incur his severest censure-it matters not whether it be State or General Government. Though any one can see that Mr. Felder has much enriched his mind by books, he professes to despise them. He maintains that reading one's self and nature, and the shifts and roguery of men, is all the reading God ever intended men to pursue. He attaches much weight to individual experience, and he would not give a glance of his own observation for the telescopic view of all the rest of the world put together. He cares not about the rhetoric of his speeches-'tis not the flesh and nerves of his argument he aims at-'tis the bone and muscle: hence he frequently throws out his ideas naked as they were born, without a rag to cover them."-Mr. Billinger's Scrap Book.
Major Felder was a thriving successful lawyer from his ad- mission to the Bar in 1808, until 1828 or '30.
He filed the bill in Equity in Orangeburgh District, in the case of Butler vs. Haskell .- 4 Eq. Rep. 651. It involved a vast amount of property and money. It was brought to a hearing
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before Chanceller Thompson, February, 1816 ; and although the Major was aided by the great talents and learning of Wm. Harper, he failed in obtaining a decree. An appeal, as of course, followed, which was heard in Columbia, in May and in December. A majority of the Court of Appeals (De Saus- sure, Waties and James,) reversed the Circuit Decree. This success placed the Major on the topmost round of the profes- sional ladder in Orangeburgh. He practiced for several years after-how long I cannot say. When he retired, he became a successful planter and mill-owner. By these means he acquired an estate, valued at more than half a million of dollars. When I was holding the Circuit Court in Orangeburgh, in 1847, he very politely invited me to ride with him over his vast domain below Orangeburgh; while making that ride, he stated his annual income at $20,000. I took the liberty of hinting to him, in a friendly way, as he was childless, what an amount of good he could do by educating some meritori- ous poor young people. He replied, that he had educated his nephews and nieces, and was then paying the way, at Carlisle College, Pennsylvania, of a young man (the son of Mr. Bon- sell, deceased, formerly of Barnwell), and a grandson or a great-grandson of Mr. Jennings, the tavern-keeper of the vil- lage of Orangeburgh, in 1805.
The Major never was married; but for many years before his death, he discharged a father's part in rearing and educa- ting the children of his deceased brother, Samuel Felder, the nephews and nieces to whom he alludes in the conversation mentioned in the paragraph above.
In August, 1831, he carried out a cherished purpose, in visiting his half-sister, Mrs. Pou, the wife of Lewis Pou, Esq., who resided in Georgia. On his return, at Union Point, on the Georgia Rail-road, on the 1st of September, 1831, he was suddenly taken ill with bilious cholic, and as a stranger, in a hut by the wayside, breathed his last. Who he was, was not known, until memoranda in his possession disclosed that the dead stranger was the Hon. John M. Felder, Senator from Orange Parish; the owner and possessor of an estate of, at least, half a million.
Death, at all times, is contemplated with awe; but death
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among strangers, with none to smooth the dying pillow, or close, with the sigh of sympathy, the dying eyes, is, indeed, more than awful. It was, however, the fate of him, who had dedi- cated his life to gain and politics, and who had never known the blessed influences of wife and children. His great estate did not pursue the line of descent, which, if he had been permitted, he would have designated. According to the decision of the Court of Errors, it descended to his half- brother and sister, and the children of his deceased full brother, per stripis, in equal shares.
Major Felder was a Democrat; and in all the phases of politics he uniformly occupied that side, and always trusted and believed that that party would save the Union.
There is no doubt, he was an honest representative in every department of legislation, in the State or Federal government. His course was generally peculiar, and his remarks eccentric. His opposition to banks, and rag money, always styled bank bills, was unceasing and inveterate.
As a lawyer, he was more marked by success in the Circuit Court, than by general reputation. After his retirement from the Bar, he did not rely upon books; he studied men, and looked out upon nature, for all the illustrations which he needed in his public speeches.
The speech of General Quattlebaum, on moving the reso- lutions in the Senate, on the occasion of his death, and an obituary, understood to have been prepared by Gov. Ham- mond, are appended, and will supply whatever is omitted in the preceding memoir :
THE LATE HON. JOHN M. FELDER.
The Hon. John M. Felder, Senator from Orange, died at Union Point, on the Georgia Rail-road, after a very short illness, on the 1st of September, 1851, when on his return home from an excursion into the uppear parts of Georgia. He was born on the 7th of July, 1782, in Orangeburg District, in which was his permanent residence through the whole of his long life, and for the soil of which he cherished an
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attachment as deep and passionate as that of the Venetian of other days for his City of the Sea.
Major Felder was educated at Yale College, and graduated there with distinction in 1804, in the same class with the Hon. John C. Calhoun-both being about the same age. He was soon after admitted to the Bar, and practiced for some twenty years at Orangeburg and in the adjoining districts, with eminent success; when the cares of a large fortune which he had accumulated by his talent and enterprise, and the exigencies of his political career, induced him to withdraw from that avocation.
For about forty years Major Felder was actively engaged in politics, filled many high posts as a Representative of the people-never any other, and occupied no inconsiderable space in the public eye.
He was elected a member of the House of Representatives in 1812, and till his death, with but a short interval, continued to be a representative of the people, either in Congress or in the General Assembly of his native State.
He supported with zeal the war of 1812, in the House of Representatives, and, on the eve of peace, he was on the march at the head of a battalion from Orangeburg District, to assist in the defence of the seaboard of the State.
In 1830 he was elected a Member of Congress, and filled that then important station with much credit to himself and great satisfaction to his constituents for the succeeding four years, when he declined being a candidate for re-election.
He was, however, soon after, in 1840, chosen State Senator for Orange, and continued to represent his beloved parish in that body without intermission until his death.
Major Felder was a Democrat, from first to last, throughout his political career ; and if politicians can be said, like poets, to be born, not made, he was undoubtedly born a Democrat, and never could have been anything else. The supporter of popular rights and interests, against aristocratic pretensions and governmental invasions, in all forms and on every occa- sion ; he carried on through life an uncompromising warfare
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against the attempts of every clique that grasped at power, and against every combination to monopolise the earnings of the people, whether on a grand sectional scale by tariffs, or within the State by local corporations. He was warmly opposed to the charter of the Bank of the State in 1812, and voted and spoke against it ; and he was uniformly and vehe- mently hostile to it to the last. Indeed, the thing he had most at heart in State affairs, and to which he devoted most of his attention for the last ten years, was the overthrow of that Bank. And so inimical was he, on the same principles, to the United States Bank, that, strict constructionist as he was, he always applauded the removal of the deposits by General Jackson. He called it "the battle of the 22d of December"-alluding to the first check given by Jackson to the British on their landing at New Orleans.
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