In this hurriedly written sketch, which is thrown together to meet the
modern exigencies of publishing, the round, and full, and complete
biography cannot be looked for. There is no time here for the selection
and arrangement in an orderly way of the details of this busy and
brilliant life. Under the circumstances, even the hand of affection can
only touch it here and there so swiftly and so lightly that the random
result must be inartistic and unsatisfactory. It was at such moments as
these—moments of hurry and high-pressure—that Mr. Grady was at his best.
His hand was never surer,—the machinery of his mind was never more
responsive to the tremendous demands he made on it,—than when the huge
press of the _Constitution_ was waiting his orders; when the forms were
waiting to be closed, when the compositors were fretting and fuming for
copy, and when, perhaps, an express train was waiting ten minutes over
its time to carry the _Constitution_ to its subscribers. All his
faculties were trained to meet emergencies; and he was never happier
than when meeting them, whether in a political campaign, in conventions,
in local issues, or in the newspaper business as correspondent or
managing editor. Pressed by the emergency of his death, which to me was
paralyzing, and by the necessity of haste, which, at this juncture, is
confusing, these reminiscences have taken on a disjointed shape sadly at
variance with the demands of literary art. Let me, therefore, somewhere
in the middle, begin at the beginning.
Henry Woodfin Grady was born in Athens, Georgia, on the 24th of April,
1850. As a little boy he was the leader of all the little boys of his
acquaintance—full of that moral audacity that takes the lead in all
innocent and healthy sports. An old gentleman, whose name I have
forgotten, came into the _Constitution_ editorial rooms shortly after
Mr. Grady delivered the New England banquet speech, to say that he knew
Henry when a boy. I listened with interest, but the memory of what he
said is vague. I remember that his reminiscences had a touch of
enthusiasm, going to show that the little boy was attractive enough to
make a deep impression on his elders. He had, even when a child, all
those qualities that draw attention and win approval. It is easy to
believe that he was a somewhat boisterous boy. Even after he had a
family of his own, and when he was supposed (as the phrase is) to have
settled down, he still remained a boy to all intents and purposes. His
vitality was inexhaustible, and his flow of animal spirits unceasing. In
all athletic sports and out-door exercises he excelled while at school
and college, and it is probable that his record as a boxer, wrestler,
sprinter, and an all-around athlete is more voluminous than his record
for scholarship. To the very last, his enthusiasm for these sports was,
to his intimate friends, one of the most interesting characteristics of
this many-sided man.
One of his characteristics as a boy, and it was a characteristic that
clung to him through all his life, was his love and sympathy for the
poor and lowly, for the destitute and the forlorn. This was one of the
problems of life that he could never understand,—why, in the economy of
Providence, some human beings should be rich and happy, and others poor
and friendless. When a very little child he began to try to solve the
problem in his own way. It was a small way, indeed, but if all who are
fortunately situated should make the same effort charity would cause the
whole world to smile, and Heaven could not possibly withhold the rich
promise of its blessings. From his earliest childhood, Mr. Grady had a
fondness for the negro race. He was fond of the negroes because they
were dependent, his heart went out to them because he understood and
appreciated their position. When he was two years old, he had a little
negro boy named Isaac to wait on him. He always called this negro
“Brother Isaac,” and he would cry bitterly, if any one told him that
Isaac was not his brother. As he grew older his interest in the negroes
and his fondness for them increased. Until he was eight or nine years
old he always called his mother “Dear mother,” and when the weather was
very cold, he had a habit of waking in the night and saying: “Dear
mother, do you think the servants have enough cover? It’s so cold, and I
want them to be warm.” His first thought was always for the destitute
and the lowly—for those who were dependent on him or on others. At home
he always shared his lunch with the negro children, and after the slaves
were freed, and were in such a destitute condition, scarcely a week
passed that some forlorn-looking negro boy did not bring his mother a
note something like this: “DEAR MOTHER: Please give this child something
to eat. He looks so hungry. H. W. G.” It need not be said that no one
bearing credentials signed by this thoughtful and unselfish boy was ever
turned away hungry from the Grady door. It may be said, too, that his
love and sympathy for the negroes was fully appreciated by that race.
His mother says that she never had a servant during all his life that
was not devoted to him, and never knew one to be angry or impatient with
him. He could never bear to see any one angry or unhappy about him. As a
child he sought to heal the wounds of the sorrowing, and to the last,
though he was worried by the vast responsibilities he had taken on his
shoulders and disturbed by the thoughtless demands made on his time and
patience, he suffered more from the sorrows of others than from any
troubles of his own. When he went to school, he carried the same
qualities of sympathy and unselfishness that had made him charming as a
child. If, among his school-mates, there was to be found a poor or a
delicate child, he took that child under his especial care, and no one
was allowed to trouble it in any way.
Shortly after he graduated at the State University, an event occurred
that probably decided Mr. Grady’s future career. In an accidental way he
went on one of the annual excursions of the Georgia Press Association as
the correspondent of the _Constitution_. His letters describing the
incidents of the trip were written over the signature of “King Hans.”
They were full of that racy humor that has since become identified with
a large part of Mr. Grady’s journalistic work. They had a flavor of
audacity about them, and that sparkling suggestiveness that goes first
by one name and then another, but is chiefly known as individuality. The
letters created a sensation among the editors. There was not much that
was original or interesting in Georgia journalism in that day and time.
The State was in the hands of the carpet-baggers, and the newspapers
reflected in a very large degree the gloom and the hopelessness of that
direful period. The editors abused the Republicans in their editorial
columns day after day, and made no effort to enlarge their news service,
or to increase the scope of their duties or their influence. Journalism
in Georgia, in short, was in a rut, and there it was content to jog.
Though the “King Hans” letters were the production of a boy, their
humor, their aptness, their illuminating power (so to say), their light
touch, and their suggestiveness, showed that a new star had arisen. They
created a lively diversion among the gloomy-minded editors for a while,
and then the procession moved sadly forward in the old ruts. But the
brief, fleeting, and humorous experience that Mr. Grady had as the
casual correspondent of the _Constitution_ decided him. Perhaps this was
his bent after all, and that what might be called a happy accident was
merely a fortunate incident that fate had arranged, for to this
beautiful and buoyant nature fate seemed to be always kind. Into his
short life it crowded its best and dearest gifts. All manner of
happiness was his—the happiness of loving and of being beloved—the
happiness of doing good in directions that only the Recording Angel
could follow—and before he died Fame came and laid a wreath of flowers
at his feet. Fate or circumstance carried him into journalism. His “King
Hans” letters had attracted attention to him, and it seemed natural that
he should follow this humorous experiment into a more serious field.
He went to Rome not long afterwards, and became editor of the Rome
_Courier_. The _Courier_ was the oldest paper in the city, and therefore
the most substantial. It was, in fact, a fine piece of property. But the
town was a growing town, and the _Courier_ had rivals, the Rome _Daily_,
if my memory serves me, and the Rome _Commercial_. Just how long Mr.
Grady edited the _Courier_, I have no record of; but one fine morning,
he thought he discovered a “ring” of some sort in the village. I do not
know whether it was a political or a financial ring. We have had so many
of these rings in one shape or another that I will not trust my memory
to describe it; but it was a ring, and probably one of the first that
dared to engage in business. Mr. Grady wrote a fine editorial denouncing
it, but when the article was submitted to the proprietor, he made some
objection. He probably thought that some of his patrons would take
offense at the strong language Mr. Grady had used. After some
conversation on the subject, the proprietor of the _Courier_ flatly
objected to the appearance of the editorial in his paper. Mr. Grady was
about eighteen years old then, with views and a little money of his own.
In the course of a few hours he had bought out the two opposing papers,
consolidated them, and his editorial attack on the ring appeared the
next morning in the Rome _Daily Commercial_. It happened on the same
morning that the two papers, the _Courier_ and the _Daily Commercial_,
both appeared with the name of Henry W. Grady as editor. The ring, or
whatever it was, was smashed. Nobody heard anything more of it, and the
_Commercial_ was greeted by its esteemed contemporaries as a most
welcome addition to Georgia journalism. It was bright and lively, and
gave Rome a new vision of herself.
It was left to the _Commercial_ to discover that Rome was a city set on
the hills, and that she ought to have an advertising torch in her hands.
The _Commercial_, however, was only an experiment. It was run, as Mr.
Grady told me long afterwards, as an amateur casual. He had money to
spend on it, and he gave it a long string to go on. Occasionally he
would fill it up with his bright fancies, and then he would neglect it
for days at a time, and it would then be edited by the foreman. It was
about this time that I met Mr. Grady. We had had some correspondence. He
was appreciative, and whatever struck his fancy he had a quick response
for. Some foolish paragraph of mine had appealed to his sense of humor,
and he pursued the matter with a sympathetic letter that made a lasting
impression. The result of that letter was that I went to Rome, pulled
him from his flying ponies, and had a most enjoyable visit. From Rome we
went to Lookout Mountain, and it is needless to say that he was the life
of the party. He was its body, its spirit, and its essence. We found, in
our journey, a dissipated person who could play on the zither. Just how
important that person became, those who remember Mr. Grady’s pranks can
imagine. The man with the zither took the shape of a minstrel, and in
that guise he went with us, always prepared to make music, which he had
often to do in response to Mr. Grady’s demands.
Rome, however, soon ceased to be large enough for the young editor.
Atlanta seemed to offer the widest field, and he came here, and entered
into partnership with Colonel Robert A. Alston and Alex St.
Clair-Abrams. It was a queer partnership, but there was much that was
congenial about it. Colonel Alston was a typical South Carolinian, and
Abrams was a Creole. It would be difficult to get together three more
impulsive and enterprising partners. Little attention was paid to the
business office. The principal idea was to print the best newspaper in
the South, and for a time this scheme was carried out in a magnificent
way that could not last. Mr. Grady never bothered himself about the
finances, and the other editors were not familiar with the details of
business. The paper they published attracted more attention from
newspaper men than it did from the public, and it was finally compelled
to suspend. Its good will—and it had more good will than capital—was
sold to the _Constitution_, which had been managed in a more
conservative style. It is an interesting fact, however, that Mr. Grady’s
experiments in the _Herald_, which were failures, were successful when
tried on the _Constitution_, whose staff he joined when Captain Evan P.
Howell secured a controlling interest. And yet Mr. Grady’s development
as a newspaper man was not as rapid as might be supposed. He was
employed by the _Constitution_ as a reporter, and his work was
intermittent.
One fact was fully developed by Mr. Grady’s early work on the
_Constitution_,—namely, that he was not fitted for the routine work of a
reporter. One day he would fill several columns of the paper with his
bright things, and then for several days he would stand around in the
sunshine talking to his friends, and entertaining them with his racy
sayings. I have seen it stated in various shapes in books and magazines
that the art of conversation is dead. If it was dead before Mr. Grady
was born, it was left to him to resurrect it. Charming as his pen was,
it could bear no reasonable comparison with his tongue. I am not
alluding here to his eloquence, but to his ordinary conversation. When
he had the incentive of sympathetic friends and surroundings, he was the
most fascinating talker I have ever heard. General Toombs had large
gifts in that direction, but he bore no comparison in any respect to Mr.
Grady, whose mind was responsive to all suggestions and to all subjects.
The men who have made large reputations as talkers have had the habit of
selecting their own subjects and treating them dogmatically. We read of
Coleridge buttonholing an acquaintance and talking him to death on the
street, and of Carlyle compelling himself to be heard by sheer
vociferousness. Mr. Grady could have made the monologue as interesting
as he did his orations, but this was not his way. What he did was to
take up whatever commonplace subject was suggested, and so charge it
with his nimble wit and brilliant imagination as to give it a new
importance.
It was natural, under the circumstances, that his home in Atlanta should
be the center of the social life of the city. He kept open house, and,
aided by his lovely wife and two beautiful children, dispensed the most
charming hospitality. There was nothing more delightful than his
home-life. Whatever air or attitude he had to assume in business, at
home he was a rollicking and romping boy. He put aside all dignity
there, and his most distinguished guest was never distinguished enough
to put on the airs of formality that are commonly supposed to be a part
of social life. His home was a typical one,—the center of his affections
and the fountain of all his joys—and he managed to make all his friends
feel what a sacred place it was. It was the headquarters of all that is
best and brightest in the social and intellectual life of Atlanta, and
many of the most distinguished men of the country have enjoyed the
dispensation of his hospitality, which was simple and homelike, having
about it something of the flavor and ripeness of the old Southern life.
In writing of the life and career of a man as busy in so many directions
as Mr. Grady, one finds it difficult to pursue the ordinary methods of
biographical writing. One finds it necessary, in order to give a clear
idea of his methods, which were his own in all respects, to be
continually harking back to some earlier period of his career. I have
alluded to his distaste for the routine of reportorial work. The daily
grind—the treadmill of trivial affairs—was not attractive to him; but
when there was a sensation in the air—when something of unusual
importance was happening or about to happen—he was in his element. His
energy at such times was phenomenal. He had the faculty of grasping all
the details of an event, and the imagination to group them properly so
as to give them their full force and effect. The result of this is shown
very clearly in his telegrams to the New York _Herald_ and the
_Constitution_ from Florida during the disputed count going on there in
1876 and the early part of 1877. Mr. Tilden selected Senator Joseph E.
Brown, among other prominent Democrats, to proceed to Florida, and look
after the Democratic case there. Mr. Grady went as the special
correspondent of the New York _Herald_ and the Atlanta _Constitution_,
and though he had for his competitors some of the most famous special
writers of the country, he easily led them all in the brilliancy of his
style, in the character of his work, and in his knack of grouping
together gossip and fact. He was always proud of his work there; he was
on his mettle, as the saying is, and I think there is no question that,
from a journalist’s point of view, his letters and telegrams, covering
the history of what is known politically as the Florida fraud, have no
equal in the newspaper literature of the day. There is no phase of that
important case that his reports do not cover, and they represent a vast
amount of rapid and accurate work—work in which the individuality of the
man is as prominent as his accuracy and impartiality. One of the results
of Mr. Grady’s visit to Florida, and his association with the prominent
politicians gathered there, was to develop a confidence in his own
powers and resources that was exceedingly valuable to him when he came
afterwards to the management of the leading daily paper in the South. He
discovered that the men who had been successful in business and in
politics had no advantage over him in any of the mental qualities and
attributes that appertain to success, and this discovery gave purpose
and determination to his ambition.
Another fruitful fact in his career, which he used to dwell on with
great pleasure, was his association while in Florida with Senator
Brown—an association that amounted to intimacy. Mr. Grady always had a
very great admiration for Senator Brown, but in Florida he had the
opportunity of working side by side with the Senator and of studying the
methods by which he managed men and brought them within the circle of
his powerful influence. Mr. Grady often said that it was one of the most
instructive lessons of his life to observe the influence which Senator
Brown, feeble as he was in body, exerted on men who were almost total
strangers. The contest between the politicians for the electoral vote of
Florida was in the nature of a still hunt, where prudence, judgment,
skill, and large knowledge of human nature were absolutely essential. In
such a contest as this, Senator Brown was absolutely master of the
situation, and Mr. Grady took great delight in studying his methods, and
in describing them afterwards.
Busy as Mr. Grady was in Florida with the politicians and with his
newspaper correspondence, he nevertheless found time to make an
exhaustive study of the material resources of the State, and the result
of this appeared in the columns of the _Constitution_ at a later date in
the shape of a series of letters that attracted unusual attention
throughout the country. This subject, the material resources of the
South, and the development of the section, was always a favorite one
with Mr. Grady. He touched it freely from every side and point of view,
and made a feature of it in his newspaper work. To his mind there was
something more practical in this direction than in the heat and fury of
partisan politics. Whatever would aid the South in a material way,
develop her resources and add to her capital, population, and
industries, found in him not only a ready, but an enthusiastic and a
tireless champion. He took great interest in politics, too, and often
made his genius for the management of men and issues felt in the affairs
of the State; but the routine of politics—the discussion that goes on,
like Tennyson’s brook, forever and forever—were of far less importance
in his mind than the practical development of the South. This seemed to
be the burthen of his speeches, as it was of all his later writings. He
never tired of this subject, and he discussed it with a brilliancy, a
fervor, a versatility, and a fluency marvelous enough to have made the
reputation of half a dozen men. Out of his contemplation of it grew the
lofty and patriotic purpose which drew attention to his wonderful
eloquence, and made him famous throughout the country—the purpose to
draw the two sections together in closer bonds of union, fraternity,
harmony, and good-will. The real strength and symmetry of his career can
only be properly appreciated by those who take into consideration the
unselfishness with which he devoted himself to this patriotic purpose.
Instinctively the country seemed to understand something of this, and it
was this instinctive understanding that caused him to be regarded with
affectionate interest and appreciation from one end of the country to
the other by people of all parties, classes, and interests. It was this
instinctive understanding that made him at the close of his brief career
one of the most conspicuous Americans of modern times, and threw the
whole country into mourning at his death.