Biographical sketches of the bench and bar of South Carolina, vol. II, Part 36

Author: O'Neall, John Belton, 1793-1863
Publication date: 1859
Publisher: Charleston, S.C. : S.G. Courtenay & Co.
Number of Pages: 636


USA > South Carolina > Biographical sketches of the bench and bar of South Carolina, vol. II > Part 36


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Colonel Williams bore a part in all the controversies between the Nullification and Union parties from 1830 to 1834, when, in December, fortunately, the strife ceased. Colonel Williams, in the fall of 1835, removed to Mobile, Alabama, and remain- ed there three or four years, when he removed, from the belief that the yellow fever would then prevail. In 1841, he settled in Montgomery, where he now resides. He was a Member of the House of Representatives from 1820 to 1834; and my knowledge of him as a legislator enables me to say that he was a good and useful one. His modesty kept him back from assuming and maintaining, as a debater, that stand to which


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his eminent abilities entitled him. He spoke rarely in the House of Representatives, and often with evident embarrass- ment.


He was concerned in the great cases of the State ex rela- tione McCrady vs. Hunt, and the State ex relatione McDaniel vs. McMeckin, (12 Hill, page 1,) in which the constitutionality of the oath of allegiance prescribed by the Act of 1833, and required to be taken by the militia officers of the State, was drawn in question, and which, in May, 1834, was decided by a majority of the Court of Appeals, (Johnson and O'Neall,) to be unconstitutional. Mr. Williams' able argument will be found in 2 Hill, p. 133.


In speaking of this matter, my mind recurs to the great excitement which followed that decision-the threats with which the majority of the Court were pursued-the over- whelming of the most useful branch of jurisprudence, (the separate Court of Appeals,) which has ever existed in the State; and the final compromise, which, by the resolution of 1834, deprived the new oath of allegiance of its odious meaning, and, in point of fact, made it no more than the former constitutional oath. One of the great errors of my public life was committed in not resigning in December, 1835, when the Court of Appeals was destroyed. Then I could have returned successfully to the Bar, and enjoyed my home and attended to my private affairs ; from both of which I have been almost ever since a stranger. But that which has been loss and grief to me may have been for the good of South Carolina-my own, my native home-and, if so, I ought to bow submissively, as I hope I do.


Colonel Williams, in a Court-House, and before a Jury, was one of the most plausible, forcible, and successful advocates whom I ever heard. He never pretended to be a learned lawyer. I recollect his saying to me, relative to the case of Howard vs. Williams, Ist Bail., 575: "I always understand the law better when ruled in one of my own cases."


When I speak of him as a jury-lawyer, I do not mean to detract from him in other respects. I have heard him make many, very many, fine arguments, in the Circuit Court of Equity and in the Court of Appeals.


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Colonel Williams, when I last saw him, was a firm speci- men of a Carolina gentleman, fully six feet high, of athletic frame and proportion, complexion and hair dark, with a remarkably intelligent face, manners courtly and polished. Time, I know, has, ere this, blanched his raven locks, dimmed the lustre of his eyes, and shaken that frame which was once unyielding. Still I know that, although he may soon see three-score and ten, he, like my venerable friend, Governor Johnson, said of himself, he has "a young heart," and one which beats true to wife, children, friends, and country.


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GEORGE MCDUFFIE.


This extraordinary man and myself were intimately as- sociated in early life. We were in the South Carolina College together; I in the Senior, while he was in the Junior Class. We were members of the same society-the Clarios- ophic-and debated many a question together. He was re- garded, then, as a young man of extraordinary talents, but he had not that passionate and eloquent declamation which he afterwards displayed in Congress. His speeches were


more argumentative than eloquent. In his junior year, about June, he left college, by the permission of the Faculty, to accept a place as private tutor in the family of Colonel Haskell, of St. Matthews; this being necessary to give him the means to complete his education. He returned in Octo- ber, 1812, and graduated with the first honor, in the Class of that year.


George McDuffie, it is said, was born in Columbia County, Georgia, about the year 1788. He was a clerk in the mercan- tile establishment of James Calhoun, in Augusta, Georgia. This gentleman mentioned him to his brother, William Cal- houn, as a lad of great talents, but having no means to procure an education. Mr. William Calhoun, with his char- acteristic generosity, proposed to board and educate him, at Dr. Waddell's school, Willington, in the neighborhood of which he lived.


He accordingly took him into his own family, and sent him to the school at Willington. A lady stated to me, that Mr. McDuffie was then so poor that he had nothing but a little blue box, in which his scanty supply of clothing was con- tained. He soon distanced all competition, and in a very short time was prepared for College; and at the Commence- ment in December, 1811, he entered the Junior Class, and was soon acknowledged as the first man in it. His graduating speech on the "Permanence of the Union," was printed, at


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the request of the students. It is a little remarkable, that his opening speech on the threshold of life, should have set before the country his belief in the permanency of that Union which many of his speeches, in and out of Congress, subsequently, so much jeopardized.


He studied, and in the short period from December, 1813, to May, 1814, he prepared himself for admission in Law and Equity. We were admitted in the same class, in May, 1814. He settled at Pendleton, and literally did nothing. In Decem- ber, following, he was a candidate for Solicitor of the Western Circuit. He received a respectable vote, considering that he was only a few months old at the Bar. Benjamin H. Saxon, of Abbeville, and William F. Downs, Esq., of Laurens, were also candidates, and Mr. Saxon was elected. This defeat, which seemed to him, at the time, to be his greatest misfor- tune, was, I have no doubt, the turning point of his life, which enabled him to seize wealth, fame and power, as rapidly as he could desire.


He became, about that time, the partner of Colonel Eldred Simkins, of Edgefield, who had a full practice and a fine library. These were the means which Mr. McDuffie needed to place him among the first lawyers of the State. Colonel Simkins' kindness introduced him into the best society.


His rise was rapid, beyond parallel, arguing successfully and ably, both on the Circuit and in the Court of Appeals, many of the most abstruse and difficult points of law. He practiced on the entire Western Circuit, as well as at Edge- field. There, too, in his own name, he obtained a large practice. At Abbeville, he managed successfully Patrick Duncan's cases (commonly called the Jew's-land cases), for the recovery of 50,000 acres of land and upwards. His fee on that matter was, in itself, a moderate fortune. Business from all quarters, and at all Courts-Civil and Criminal, poured in upon him. His speech for General Hampton, in the case of Taylor vs. Hampton, upon a question at that time novel in our Courts, was said to have been a fine one; but his eloquence could neither sway the Jury nor the Court. His argument for Mr. Stark, in the Constitutional Court, in


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favor of his view, i. e., that his Commission as Solicitor, was " for good behavior," and consequently, that Mr. Jeter could not supersede him by his election by the General Assembly, I heard, and it satisfied me thoroughly, that he was right. The Court, however, thought otherwise, and their decision, and not my opinion, became the law of the land.


In October, 1818, Mr. McDuffie was elected to the House of Representatives of South Carolina from Edgefield District. His speeches there, and his business habits, won him great celebrity.


In 1818, he was elected by the Board, a Trustee of the South Carolina College. In October, 1820, he was elected from Edgefield and Abbeville to Congress, as the successor of his early friend and patron, Col. Simkins.


About this time he was involved in the unfortunate duel with Colonel Cumming, which was brought about by the in- discreet zeal of his friends, and which inflicted upon him a wound, which certainly changed the whole character of his disposition, embittered his life, and finally sent him, shattered and a wreck, to his tomb. When I make these observations, I do so from a perfect knowledge of Mr. McDuffie. In his youth and until he was wounded, he exhibited no irritability. Indeed, I should have said, as his sister did, that his temper was a good one. All who knew him afterwards are obliged to admit his great irritability. He certainly exhibited great uneasiness from the nervous irritation arising from his spinal wound. And would that I could forget, now and forever, the condition in which I last saw him, in October, 1850. He was no longer the man who once delighted Senates, and governed men by his eloquence. He then needed the hand of friend- ship to sustain him, and the mind of more than a friend-a father-to guide him.


In December 1821, Mr. McDuffie entered Congress, the ad- vocate of a liberal construction of the Constitution, and the friend of Mr. Calhoun. When he changed his views as to the construction of the Constitution, I do not know. That he did so, I do not doubt, and I have as little doubt that the change was the result of an honest conviction. But I presume it was


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shortly after Judge Smith had changed the politics of the State, in 1824.


The Tariff controversy began soon after, and Mr. McDuffie threw himself into the front rank of the opponents of that measure. Many of his propositions were novel and extrava- gant, as for instance his forty-bale theory, which he main- tained with great earnestness. Yet, in the main he was right. That measure was unjust and oppressive ; and, certainly while it had the letter of the Constitution in its favor, it violated its spirit, in favoring one class of industry at the expense of an- other. He sustained President Jackson, in the canvass which preceded his election in 1828; but after 1829, he ceased to stand alongside of the Hero of the Hermitage. In 1829, Mr. McDuffie married an accomplished and wealthy young lady, the daughter of Colonel Richard Singleton ; but he had scarcely touched the cup of bliss when it was dashed from his lips- she died in 1830, leaving an only child, now the interesting wife of Colonel Wade Hampton. In 1830, the Nullification movement was rushing to a head. From a conversation had with him in December of that year, I know that he had no faith in " Nullification, as a peaceable and Constitutional measure." He believed in revolution as the only measure of redress, and went for Nullification as the nearest approach to that which he could obtain.


He certainly was the strongest and boldest member of his party, in the celebrated Nullification Convention. He assented most reluctantly to the compromise made by Clay and Cal- houn, of the Tariff, and, consequently, to the recision of the Ordinance of Nullification. It was then, and now, a source of unmingled joy, that more moderate councils prevailed, and that our country has, in spite of his belief to the contrary, continued for more than a quarter of a century, to promote the liberty, wealth and happiness of our citizens.


In 1824, (April 3d and 4th,) he delivered one of his strong- est speeches against the removal of the deposits from the Bank of the United States by President Jackson, which he characterized " as an act of usurpation, under circumstances of injustice and oppression, which warranted him in saying


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that the rights of widows and orphans had been trampled in the dust by the foot of a tyrant." This grave charge he pro- ceeded to maintain in a speech of twenty-four pages, the result of his indignant feelings. But what has been the result of time? Now many are satisfied that the President was right, and Mr. McDuffie mistaken.


In December, 1834, he was elected to the office of Major- General, and he became instantly enamored of a military life, which, when I held the same distinction in another part of the State, he had ridiculed as mere pomp and parade. He became, as he believed, capable of anything in the military world, which the greatest commanders ever had achieved ; and if the country had been involved in the horrors of a civil war, I think it very likely that Gen. McDuffie would have been the successful leader in many a bloody field. But here I again rejoice, that his vaulting ambition was disappointed.


In December, 1834, he was elected Governor and Comman- der-in-Chief in and over the State of South Carolina. In that capacity as President of the Board of Trustees of his Alma Mater, in 1835, he contributed much to raise her up from her fallen and perishing condition, by the re-organiza- tion of the Faculty. At the expiration of this office, which had only been signalized by the organization of the regiment of mounted volunteers, under Col. Robt. H. Goodwyn, who were dispatched by the Governor, under the requisition of the war department, against the Seminole Indians, he retired to private life for about six years, with the exception that, in 1836, he was elected by the Board a Trustee of the South Carolina College, and the Legislature in 1837 conferred on him the same distinction ; but these offices did not interfere with his retirement. In 1842, he obeyed the call of the State to represent her in the Senate of the United States. His want of health would very well have excused him from this duty, but he would not refuse as long as he had strength enough to carry him to the Senate Chamber. He took a prominent part in the passage of the Sub-Treasury Bill and the annex- ation of Texas. Both of these measures had met with his denunciation formerly. He had, however, lived to see his


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errors, and honestly came forward to correct, and did correct them. He aided, too, in the Tariff of 1846, which, in some degree, yielded principles against which he had formerly con- tended.


At the close of the session of 1846 he resigned, and, until the spring of 1851, he lingered, a dying man. Then he closed a life which had been remarkable for genius, honesty and eloquence.


Mr. McDuffie was in youth, manhood and old age, a re- markable man for his taciturnity and reserve. He literally seemed to commune with himself; yet there were occasions, when he met old friends and companions, in which he seemed to enjoy life with as much zest as any man.


He was very abstemious, seldom touching wine and never strong drink (within my knowledge). It was this feature of his life, which in a wasting and suffering body, enabled him to accomplish so much.


Mr. McDuffie was, I believe, a true patriot; it is true I often thought him wrong, yet I believed he thought the op- pressions of the majority sanctified his course.


In 1851, the fall after his death, at Davison College, in my address on public speaking, I gave, what I believe, a just de- scription of him as an orator and a man, in a few words. " With a thousand times more honesty, McDuffie has sur- passed the most brilliant efforts of France's greatest orator, Mirabeau. McDuffie, with a head as clear as a sun-beam, with a heart as pure as honesty itself, and with a purpose as firm as a rock, never spoke unaccompanied with a passionate conviction of right, which made his arguments as irresistible as the rushing flood of his own Savannah."


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ROBERT ANDREW TAYLOR.


Robert Andrew Taylor, the son of John and Margaret Tay- lor, was born in the City of London, on the 9th of February, 1792.


When but a few weeks old, he was brought by his parents to Georgetown, in the State of South Carolina; and, within the first year of his life, he had a malignant attack of conflu- ent small pox, from which he recovered, as if by a miracle, after his case had been abandoned by his physicians as utterly hopeless. The indelible marks of that peculiar disease, al- though thus early impressed, he carried with him to his grave.


His early school days were passed at Georgetown, until he had reached his thirteenth year, and then, for two years, he was at a classical academy at Newark, in New Jersey. His studies preparatory to his entering the South Carolina College, were directed by Mr. Roberts, the teacher of a once famous school at Statesburg, in the District of Sumter. When just ready to apply for admission to the privileges of his college, at the Commencement in December, 1808, he was suddenly summoned to the death-bed of his mother! It was that mother to whose unslumbering watchfulness he had been indebted, under God, for his continuance in life, and to whose tender lessons of virtue and wisdom, he owed those qualities of heart and of character, which rendered his life a blessing to himself and to society.


Up to this period of his days, young Taylor had been re- markable for a steadiness of character, and unyielding con- sistency of conduct, very unusual in one of his years. In January, 1809, he joined the Sophomore Class at College, and from the first to the last of his college career, he was amongst the most diligent, and stainless, and accomplished of his fel- lows. He graduated with distinction in the class of 1811, and immediately afterwards entered upon the study of law


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at Charleston, in the office of the then Attorney-General, and afterwards one of the Judges of the State, the Hon. John S. Richardson.


In the summer of 1813, Mr. Taylor came to Newberry and studied law with Anderson Crenshaw, Esq., afterwards Judge Crenshaw, of Alabama. His class-mate, John G. Brown, of Newberry, and John Waties, of Sumter, were also students at the same time with Mr. Crenshaw. Judge O'Neall, who had been in college with Mr. Taylor, but who graduated in the class of 1812, was also a student at Newberry, but studied with John Caldwell, Esq.


Messrs. Taylor and Brown, were admitted to the Bar in Charleston in January, 1814.


Judge O'Neall remarks, " that he knew Mr. Taylor while in college, from February, 1811, to December, 1812, and after- wards while studying law with Judge Crenshaw, and he concurs fully in all said of him."


In due season he was admitted to the Bar, and commenced his professional life at Georgetown. The law business with which he was entrusted, was, from the very first, extensive and lucrative, and few young lawyers ever rose more rapidly in the estimation of the profession, and in the confidence of the community. For eight years after entering on the practice of law, he devoted his time and all his energies, with unrelaxing industry, to his profession. Unseduced by the glitter of military life, and standing strong against the temp- tations to political advancement, he gave himself entirely to the interests of his clients.


At the election for Members of the Legislature in October, 1822, he, for the first time, yielded to the wishes of his friends, and was chosen a Representative from the election District of Prince George, Winyaw. After serving for the two sessions of 1822 and 1823, he was again returned as a Member of the Legislature of the State in 1824,* and served in the session


* At the close of the session of 1824, occurred one of those saturnalia, which was the cause of much mirth.


In the course of the session, a worthy lady from Georgetown, Mrs. R. S. M. Hardwicke, had been elected Register Mesne Conveyances. Saturday night,


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of that year, and for the year 1825. In the year following, he was again a candidate for the suffrages of the people, but a few weeks before the time for the election, he was seized with a bilious fever, which terminated his brief but highly useful life, on the 22d day of September, 1826.


In 1824, Mr. Taylor was appointed the aid of his class- mate, Gov. Manning, and thus had the title of Col. Taylor. He was a part of that brilliant cortege who accompanied the Governor in March, 1825, in his reception of Gen. La Fayette.


During the four years that Col. Taylor was a Member of the House of Representatives, Judge O'Neal was also a Mem- ber; and from 1824 to 1826, was Speaker. He had a perfect opportunity of observing and knowing Col. Taylor, and he has no hesitation in saying that he was not only one of the most upright, but also one of the most useful members. His early death was deplored by every one who knew him, and certainly his constituents had great cause to lament the sad event which deprived them forever of his services.


the House was waiting upon the engrossing of the Acts. To enable the mem- bers to enjoy the contemplated fun, the Speaker was desired to appoint some one in his place, and retire to take his tea. Accordingly, the late Tandy Walker, Esq., of Greenville, was called to the Chair. Samuel Dixon, Esq., of Pendleton, who was a man of considerable power of language, but who was constantly more or less under the influence of wine, was selected as the leader of the frolic. John G. Brown, of Newberry, who loved fun as he did a feast, drew up a reso- lution to this effect :


" Resolved, That a Committee be raised to inquire whether R. S. M. Hard- wicke, lately elected Register of Mesne Conveyances, for Georgetown District, is a free white man within the meaning of the Constitution."


Mr. Dixon moved the resolution and Mr Brown seconded it ; when I returned to the House, Mr. Dixon was in the full blast of an oratorical display. He deplored the effect of electing a female to office. One of the consequences, said he, will be that we shall have petticoats strutting in the lobby of the State House. Sir, said he, "the honorable gentleman from Prince George, Winyaw, (meaning Col. Taylor,) intends to commit a fraud on the Constitution. He knows he can- not hold two offices at the same time : he intends to go home and marry the lady, and thus evade the Constitution." Hugh S. Legare, who was busily writing at his place, and who had not observed what was going on, and who supposed the Speaker was in his place, sprung to his feet and said, "order, Mr. Speaker, order !"


Mr. Dixon crossed the floor near to Mr. Legaré, and making a low bow, said- "Mr. Speaker, I always yield the floor to the celebrated orator from the City of Charlestown." The House exploded in laughter, the Speaker took his seat and the frolic was ended !


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Mr. Taylor was never married, and at his death he left behind him an aged father, and an only brother,* much younger than he was, and who thus found himself the sole survivor of a family of eleven children.


Mr. Taylor was not only a lawyer and legislator, from his school-days he had cultivated a taste for elegant literature, and was always distinguished for the purity and touching felicity with which he wrote the English language. In his hours of relaxation from severer studies, he amused himself with preparing articles for the newspapers and magazines of the day ; and to the friends who well knew the contributions thus made to the ephemeral literature of the times, it has ever since been a source of curious interest to mark how frequently, and in how many ever-varying shapes, his articles have been served up, as new things, by the petty and pilfering caterers for the press.


* The Rev. Thomas House Taylor, D. D., of "the South Carolina Col- lege," class of 1819. At this time, (June, 1859,) and for more than twenty-five years past, the Rector of Grace Church, in the City of New York.


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WHITFIELD BROOKS.


This gentleman was the son of Col. Zachariah Smith Brooks, and Elizabeth, the youngest daughter of Captain James Butler, who was killed in the foray of the "bloody scout," in October, 1781, at Turner's Station, on Cloud's Creek, Edge- field District. She was about seven years old at her father's death, and is better known as the youngest sister of General William Butler. Whitfield Brooks was born in Newberry Dis- trict ; but his father afterwards removed to Big Creek, Edge- field District, where he lived, and died beyond the age of three-score and ten. Whitfield Brooks received his academic eduaation mainly at Mount Bethel, in Newberry District. He graduated in the South Carolina College, in the class of 1812, and was one of four (Preston, O'Hara, Brooks and Massey), who were appointed to deliver orations at Commencement. Some of his classmates-Pinckney and O'Neall-who received the first and second honors, and Preston, who was the first of the four to whom orations were assigned, are not unknown, and are still spared by the mercy of God.


He studied law at Edgefield, with Col. Simkins, and was admitted to the Bar, in Columbia, in 1815. The Court of Equity for Edgefield, was established in 1814, and imme- diately thereafter, Whitfield Brooks received the pro tem. ap- pointment of Commissioner in Equity for Edgefield, from the Governor. He was, subsequently, in December, 1815, elected by the Legislature to the same office, which he held for eigh- teen years, and until he was forced to resign, on account of ill health. He married, on the 16th of June, 1818, Miss Mary P. Carroll, of the City of Charleston. He served in the House of Representatives, from Edgefield District, one or more terms.




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