“It’s going to be a good speech, Horace, and it will surely attract
attention,” said Rhoda Ware to her counsel on the day before the
opening of her trial.
Hardaker had just gone over with her an outline of the address he would
make in summing up her case. It was intended for the people outside
the court room, near and far, who would talk about it and read it in
the newspapers, quite as much as for the ears of the jurors. So high
and strong had risen the feeling on the slavery question that in some
parts of Ohio, as well as elsewhere, the lawyer who devoted energy and
ability to the defense of captured fugitives and their helpers could
be sure of early and ample political reward. Hardaker was ambitious.
He meant, as soon as he could reach an opening door, to enter upon a
public career and he had mapped out for himself election to Congress,
and after that a steady ascent to high places in national affairs--such
a career as, half a century ago, engaged the talents and aspirations
of ten times as many eager and capable young men as now think it worth
consideration. The fact is an ugly one and not creditable to the
quality of our national growth.
But for Horace Hardaker in this present case the spurrings of ambition
were only an added incentive. His conviction was profound that slavery
was an evil and the Fugitive Slave Act a monstrous law and his desire
to oppose either or both or anything that tended to strengthen the
institution of slavery amounted to a passion. And, in addition to these
motives, his intimate friendship with Dr. Ware and his love for Rhoda
incited him to exert himself to the utmost in her defense.
“I hope it will, Rhoda,” he replied, “but I’m doubtful if it will do
you any good. Your violation of the law was open and flagrant and we
don’t want to deny it or attempt to mitigate it in the least.”
“Indeed we don’t.”
“The decision in the case, then, will depend entirely on the political
sympathies of the jury, and the other side is not likely to allow any
man on it who has anti-slavery convictions. It would be a victory worth
while, Rhoda, if I could get you off! Not only for you, which would
gratify me enough, but for the anti-slavery cause! To have conviction
refused in a case as bare-faced as this would be a big blow toward
making the Fugitive Slave law a dead letter!”
“If I could think,” said Rhoda earnestly, “that any act of mine would
help to bring that about, I’d be willing to undergo this all over
again.”
He looked at her admiringly and drew his chair nearer, as he said:
“Well, you can rest assured that your attempt to help Mary Ellen is
having important results. And the waves are spreading out and getting
bigger, Rhoda!” Another hitch brought his chair still closer.
“I’m glad of that, and I want you to remember, Horace, when you are
making your speech, that you are not to consider me or my sentence
at all. Say the thing that will help toward what we all want. Don’t
think about me--just think about Mary Ellen and what she was willing
to undergo, and all the rest of those poor black creatures that are
longing so for their freedom.”
His chair was beside hers now and he was seizing her hand. “Rhoda! Not
think about you! How can I help it? Don’t you know I’m always thinking
about you and always hoping that some day you’ll think better about
what I’ve been hoping for so long? Isn’t there any chance, any prospect
of a chance, for me yet?”
She laid her free hand upon his two that were clasping hers. “I’m
sorry, Horace! You know how much I like you, how much I prize your
friendship--but you are like a dear brother to me, Horace, and I can’t
think of you any other way!”
“But isn’t it possible that sometime--don’t you think, Rhoda, that
after a while you’ll learn to like me the other way too? You know what
I am, you know how much I love you--won’t my heart’s love draw yours,
after a while?”
She shook her head and drew her hands away. “No, Horace, there isn’t
any hope, not the least in the world. And I wish, dear Horace, I wish
you would put it quite out of your mind. Don’t waste any more time
thinking about me. There is many a nice girl who would make you a good
wife, and I do wish, Horace, for your own sake, you would fall in love
with one and marry her.”
He looked at her searchingly. “When a girl talks that way she really
means it.”
“You know I mean it, Horace.”
“I mean, Rhoda, that she knows her own heart, clear through, and feels
sure about it.”
“That’s the way I know mine,” she answered softly.
He seized her hand again as he exclaimed, “Does that mean, Rhoda, that
there is some one else and that your heart is full already?”
“Yes, Horace. It means that I love some one else so deeply that I can
never have a love thought for any other man. I love him with all my
heart, although I don’t suppose I shall ever marry him. But I shall
never marry any one else, and I could no more think of you or any one
else with the kind of love you want than I could if I were his wife.”
There was something like reverence in the gesture with which he put
down her hand. “Then that is the end of it for me, Rhoda. Would
you mind telling me, is it that”--he paused an instant, supplying
mentally the adjective with which he usually thought of Rhoda’s
lover--“slaveholder, Delavan, from Kentucky?”
“Yes, Horace.”
He rose and took up his hat. “If that’s the way it is with you,” he
began, then stopped, looking fixedly. “Poor girl!” he went on, resting
his hand lightly for an instant upon her head. “You ought to have had a
happier fate!”
“It’s as good as I deserve, Horace,” she replied cheerfully. Then her
face lighted with the glow that had been in her heart since Delavan’s
visit, and she went on: “And it might have been so much worse!”
That same glow, as of profound inward happiness, was upon her
countenance the next day as she sat in the court room. On one side of
her was her father and on the other sat Rachel Benedict, with wrinkled
hands primly folded in the lap of her plain gray gown, her kindly,
bright old eyes and sweet smile bent now and then upon her young
friend as she whispered some encouraging word. Behind her were Mrs.
Hardaker and Marcia Kimball and other friends from the Hillside Female
Anti-Slavery Society.
In the back of the room, throughout the trial, sat Jefferson Delavan.
He was always in his place in the same seat, when she entered, and
their eyes would meet once and a faint smile play around her lips for
an instant. Then she would not look again in his direction, but her
face kept always its glow of inward happiness.
Horace Hardaker sat with his gaze moodily fixed upon Delavan’s dark
head. Jeff’s eyes were upon Rhoda’s face and Hardaker felt resentfully
that within their depths must lie some hint of the lover’s yearning. It
was almost time for him to begin his address. But his thoughts were not
upon what he was about to say nor upon how he could most move the jury.
Instead they were busy, with indignant wonder, upon how “that damned
slaveholder” had contrived to win the rich and undying love of such a
girl as Rhoda Ware.
For the way of a man with a maid is always a sealed book to other men.
A woman can guess, or she knows instinctively, how and why another
woman has won a man’s love. But the side of a man’s nature with which
he does his wooing is so different from any manifestation of himself
that he makes among his fellows that to them it is an unknown land.
Therefore they are inclined to be skeptical as to its attractiveness.
But Hardaker was much more than skeptical. He was irritated, and even
angry, that “such a man as that” should have dared to think himself
worthy of Rhoda’s love. And when he presently rose to address the jury
the rankling in his heart lent sharper vigor to every thrust he made
against the slave power and put into his tones a savage indignation
as, with eyes fixed upon Delavan’s face, he thundered his indictments.
An audience of character and intelligence crowded the court room to the
doors, while outside, in the hall and around the windows people stood
on benches, listening intently, for hours at a time. From all over the
county, from surrounding counties, and from as far away as Cleveland,
men of substance and of prominence had left their homes and business
and journeyed hither to listen to the proceedings and to testify by
their presence their sympathy with the defense.
But the pro-slavery side also had its representatives, although in
the minority, who were of equal consequence and standing. It was such
an audience as would gratify any attorney, wishing to influence the
community as well as the jury.
As he rose for his address Hardaker presented a manly, attractive
figure and a vigorous, almost a magnetic, personality. Sweeping the
court room with his eyes, he waited for a moment and then began with a
couplet from a popular anti-slavery song, a song that had roused the
echoes in thousands of enthusiastic gatherings, all over the North. No
one within the reach of his voice needed any explanation of its meaning:
“’Tis the law of God in the human soul,
’Tis the law in the Word Divine.”
He quoted the injunction of the Mosaic law against the returning of an
escaped servant and the commands of the New Testament for the succor
of the oppressed, and in vivid language set them forth as the law of
the Divine Word, the command of God, and therefore infinitely more
binding upon men and women who believed in God and accepted the Bible
as his Word than any law made by man in defiance of the Almighty’s
command. In a voice that gave full value to its pathetic appeal he told
the story of Mary Ellen’s heroic endeavor to escape from bondage and
a fate “like unto the fires of hell.” Then he called upon the fathers
and mothers of all young girls to tell him if the command of Christ,
“Do unto others as you would that others do unto you,” had lost all
its meaning, if humanity, Christianity, fatherhood--even ordinary
manhood--no longer felt its force. Following the precedent set by a
number of lawyers of wide reputation he analyzed the relation of the
Fugitive Slave Act to the Constitution and concluded that it violated
the rights guaranteed by the basic law of the country, and therefore,
since it was unconstitutional, to disregard its provisions was not
unlawful and his client had committed no crime.
“This law was passed at the behest of the slave power,” he declared.
“It was conceived in iniquity, the iniquity of the South’s
determination to put upon slavery the seal of national approval; it was
begotten in corruption, the corruption of compromise and bargain; and
it was born in the dastardly willingness of misrepresentatives of the
people to truckle to Southern arrogance and betray the convictions and
the conscience of the North.
“Shall we then, free men and women of Ohio, betrayed as we have been
and misrepresented as we are by this so-called law, be expected to
cast aside the commands of Christianity and the obligations of common
brotherhood, transform ourselves into bloodhounds to chase the panting
fugitive and send him back to his chains and, as in this case, to
such a hell of lust and vice as all decent manhood and womanhood must
shudder at? In the name of all that humanity holds sacred, I answer,
no! A thousand times, no!
“The learned counsel for the prosecution has seen fit to sneer at our
belief in the higher law,” Hardaker went on, with body erect and hand
upraised, his full, melodious, resonant voice filling the court room
and the corridors and carrying his words even into the street. “I
answer that that law has my entire allegiance and that I stand here to
defend and uphold it and to demand the rights of those who feel bound,
as I do, by its commands. I feel assured, and you well know, gentlemen
of the jury, that I voice the sentiments of thousands upon thousands
of Christ-loving and God-fearing men and women when I say that if any
fleeing bondman comes to me in need of help, protection, and means of
flight, so help me the living God in my hour of greatest need, he
shall have them all, even to the last drop of my life’s blood!”
Like the sudden upburst of a volcano, the court room broke into
resounding applause. Men sprang to their feet, swung their hats and
cheered. Women stood upon benches, waved handkerchiefs and clapped
their hands. The rapping of the judge’s gavel and the cries of the
officers for “order in the court” were drowned in the uproar and hardly
reached even their own ears. Then the sharp insistence of hisses began
to be heard. Jefferson Delavan, who had been listening with hands
clenched, frowning brows and angry eyes, added his voice to the sounds
of disapproval. For a few minutes the tumult continued, and then, at
the judge’s order, the court officers began forcing the people out.
They poured into the street and organized a mass-meeting in the square
in front of the court house. Numbers of men came running from all
directions and while the meeting was in progress word filtered out that
the jury had found the prisoner guilty and the judge’s sentence had
imposed a fine of one thousand dollars and costs and imprisonment for
thirty days.
Resolutions were at once passed denouncing the judge and deciding,
“since the courts no longer dispensed justice,” to proceed to the jail,
liberate the other prisoners and protect them from the operations of
“an outrageously unjust and tyrannous enactment.”
Delavan, looking on at the outskirts of the gathering, heard the
resolutions. He knew that Rhoda would soon be conducted back to her
quarters in the jail and he ran thither, hoping to arrive before the
crowd of rescuers. In custody of the marshal she had just reached the
jail entrance.
“Rhoda!” he exclaimed. “You are in danger here! A mob is coming to
break in the doors. Marshal, bring her with me, so we can find a place
of safety for her.”
She drew herself up and looked at him with the same pale face and
brilliant eyes with which in the woods, so long ago, she had opposed
his quest for his fugitive slave. Scarcely she seemed the same being
who, only a few days before, had almost trembled into his embrace.
“No,” she said slowly, “these are my people and with them is where I
belong. This is where your law has sent me and while I am in its power
I want no place of safety. Marshal, take me in!”
The marshal was doubtful, asked Delavan what he meant and what he
purposed to do, and while he hesitated the mob came rushing up the
street and his only course was to hurry inside with her and bar the
door.
The mass of men surged against the jail entrance and with pieces of
timber and bars of iron soon forced their way in. Then they trooped
through the building, sweeping along all the prisoners who were
awaiting trial under the Fugitive Slave law. They urged Rhoda to walk
out into freedom and defiance of her sentence. But she smilingly shook
her head and told them:
“No, thank you. It’s better to serve out my sentence, and then I’ll be
free to defy the law again in my own way.”
Exultantly the throng poured out into the street again with the
prisoners, and faced two companies of militia, ready to fire. Even the
hottest heads among them paused at this and after some parleying they
agreed to disperse and allow the men to be taken back to confinement.
Among those awaiting trial for aiding in Mary Ellen’s rescue and escape
were the pastor of the leading Presbyterian church in the town, the
superintendent of a Methodist Sunday School, a professor from Oberlin
College who had happened to be in the place on that day, a merchant,
two lawyers and a physician, together with some clerks, laboring men,
a farmer and several free negroes. The day following the conclusion of
Rhoda’s trial was Sunday, and the Presbyterian minister preached from
the jail yard to a large concourse of people who stood for two hours
in a biting wind, for it was now well on in the winter, listening with
the closest attention. The sermon, which was mainly an anti-slavery
address, added fuel to the already flaming excitement.
Meetings were held and bands of men began to organize and arm
themselves. Militia guarded the jail night and day. The pro-slavery
sympathizers, though in the minority in this region, yet made up a
considerable share of the populace, and, angered and uneasy, they also
began to prepare for whatever might happen. To hints that the Fugitive
Slave law prisoners might yet be delivered from jail they retaliated
with threats that those of their own party who were under durance for
infraction of state laws should no longer suffer imprisonment.
So acute did the situation become that Governor Chase hurried to
Washington to consult with President Buchanan, assuring him that while
he intended to support the federal government, as long as its authority
was exercised legitimately, nevertheless he felt it his duty to protect
the state officials and the state courts and that this should be done,
though it took every man in the state to do it.
Finally, a compromise was arranged by which the federal government
dropped the remaining prosecutions for the escape of Mary Ellen and
released the prisoners, while the state authorities dismissed the suits
against the slave trader’s agent and his companion and the members of
the marshal’s posse.
The episode was amicably settled, but the flames of contention had been
so fed by it that they mounted higher and higher. Meetings continued
to be held all over those portions of the state where anti-slavery
sentiment was strong. They culminated, soon after Rhoda’s release,
in an immense mass-convention at Cleveland attended by many thousand
people and addressed by public men of distinction, where, amid the
greatest enthusiasm, resolutions were passed denouncing the Dred Scott
decision and declaring the Fugitive Slave Act unconstitutional and
therefore void.
In the pocket of the dress she had worn on the day of her arrest
Rhoda chanced to find, soon after this convention, Charlotte’s note
telling of her engagement. She smiled soberly as she thought of all the
consequences that had resulted from this manifestation of her sister’s
puckish spirit.
“If she hadn’t misled me this way,” Rhoda’s thoughts ran, “I wouldn’t
have forgotten about everything else the way I did for a few minutes,
and I would have kept watch of Mary Ellen and made her keep her veil
down, and then that man wouldn’t have recognized her, and we’d have
gone right on and nothing would have happened!”
Rhoda’s trial aroused the keenest interest all over the North. But
it was an interest that cared only for principles. The personalities
of those engaged in the matter were of the slightest consequence.
Everywhere, in newspapers and in conversation, there was discussion
of the affair, and of the consequences to which it might lead. But the
people concerned in it were only so many cogs in a mighty Wheel of
Fate, turning resistlessly, and ever about to bring into the present,
out of the unknown future, no man could tell what.
To the South and its northern sympathizers the whole affair was
irritating and alarming in high degree. Democratic newspapers and their
readers declared the attitude of “Chase and his abolition crew” to
be equivalent to a declaration of war against the United States and
welcomed the prospect, while the compromise by which the difficulty was
finally settled they described with bitterness as “another triumph”
for the creed of the “traitorous higher law with its open sanction of
treason and rebellion.”
But there was one element in the North to whom Rhoda Ware’s share
in these events was not a matter of indifference. In the eyes of
the abolitionists she was a martyr to the cause to which they were
zealously devoted and during the month in which she served out her
sentence letters poured in upon her containing money for the payment
of her fine and warm words of praise. The Female Anti-Slavery Society
of Hillside sent her the whole of their small store, saying, “we shall
be proud to share even so little in the martyrdom of our beloved
president.” Rhoda wept over it, knowing well at what cost of personal
sacrifice the little hoard had been gathered. But she knew, too,
that to beg them to take back their offering would be to stab their
very hearts. Other anti-slavery societies in Ohio and elsewhere sent
contributions. There were checks from rich men in New York, New England
and Pennsylvania, whose purses were always open for the anti-slavery
cause and whose custom it was to give brotherly encouragement to
Underground operators who fell into the toils of the Fugitive Slave
Act by helping to pay their fines. The amount in which Rhoda had been
mulcted was entirely paid, as was the assessment in many another case,
by these enthusiastic co-workers.
Most precious to her, however, were the letters which came from
abolitionists all over the country with their words of praise,
sympathy, encouragement and hope. Many of them were from men and women
whose names will be found in the pages of American history as long as
the conflict over slavery holds a place therein. Long afterward, when
many years of peace had enabled all the people of the land to look back
with calm philosophy upon those heated years of contention, and the
impartial muse of history had given to the Underground Railroad a high
place among the causes which brought on the Civil War and abolished
servitude, Rhoda Ware held these letters among her most prized mementos
of those stirring days of which she was a part.