A strong, brave, young man from Ire-land was the fa-ther of our
fif-teenth pres-i-dent. He had come here in 1783, and bought a small
farm in Penn-syl-va-ni-a; so well did he do that he soon bought a store
as well; and when, on A-pril 23d, 1791, at Cove Gap, lit-tle James was
born, his fa-ther was quite a rich man. He sent his son to the best
schools and he was just six-teen years old when he went to Dick-in-son
col-lege. Here he took first place with ease. In 1809, when he left
col-lege, he be-gan the stud-y of law. In the War of 1812 he served in
the ar-my; and at the close of the war his state chose him to help make
her laws. He was a young man when his state sent him to Wash-ing-ton
where he held his place in Con-gress for ten years. In 1831 he was sent
to Rus-sia to look out for our rights there; and in 1853 he held the
same post in Eng-land. You see, he rose fast to the first place in the
land, for in 1857 he was made pres-i-dent. While he was in the chair of
state, the Prince of Wales came here for the first time, and this shows
that Eng-land felt we were now one of the big coun-tries of the world,
and that she must treat us as such.
It was while Bu-chan-an was pres-i-dent that Cy-rus W. Field laid the
first wire un-der the O-cean, by which words could be sent from this new
land to those old lands on the oth-er side. The talk a-bout slav-er-y
was so fierce at this time that a fight in which brave lives were lost
took place, and the name which shines out bright is that of John Brown
of Kan-sas. He was a friend of the black men, and took their part. He
struck the first blow in their cause at the fort at Har-per's Fer-ry,
which he held for two days. He took all the guns that were there, as he
wished to arm the black men and then lead them to the South to fight for
their friends, held there as slaves. Of course this was a-gainst the law
of the land, and troops were sent to seize this brave and good man. His
two sons fought with him, and he saw them both shot down, but he did not
give up till in the heat of the fight he fell with six wounds. He did
not die at this time; af-ter this he was hung as one who had fought
a-gainst the law of his land. His last act, as he was on his way to the
place where he was to be hung, was to kiss a lit-tle ba-by which a poor
slave held up to him as he passed.
His death was not in vain, for from now on the ques-tion of sla-ver-y
was the talk of the whole land, and in 1860 South Car-o-li-na took the
lead and said that she would not bear the laws of the Un-ion, but would
rule her land in her own way. Soon, six more South-ern states said the
same; and these states which cut loose from the North were called the
"Con-fed-er-a-cy;" at the head as pres-i-dent was Jef-fer-son Da-vis.
This was the state of things when Bu-chan-an left the chair, and went
to his home in Penn-syl-va-ni-a, at a place called Wheat-land.
In the last year of his life he wrote a book of his life, which is still
in print. He died at his home on June 1st, 1868. He was the last of the
"Peace" pres-i-dents, for it was A-bra-ham Lin-coln who took his place,
and in his term the strife as to the slave trade led to our "Civ-il War."