BITTERNESS
I should be glad to omit all reference to the bitterness of feeling that
pervaded the minds of many in St. Louis during the period of the war,
if, without mentioning it, I could faithfully present what was there
enacted. But it was an important factor in the life of that city so long
as the gigantic and heroic struggle to preserve the Union lasted.
Happily such intense bitterness as then confronted us has forever passed
away. As a mere reminiscence it is like a wasp in amber, interesting
perchance, but harmless.
We shall best enable the generation born since the war vividly to
apprehend the extreme virulence of not a few in St. Louis at that time,
by calling attention to some concrete examples of it.
Soon after the taking of Camp Jackson, when a multitude of national
banners, large and small, began to be displayed, a mother with her
little son, who was not more than five years old, boarded an Olive
Street horse-car. Some one had given to the little boy a tiny flag. Up
to that moment she had not observed it. When she caught sight of it,
before all in the car she cried, in anger, “Where did you get that dirty
rag?” Then snatching it from the hand of her child, she threw it upon
the floor as though it were a viper, and stamping it beneath her feet,
said in a rage, “Let me never see you touch that vile thing again.” Such
an exhibition of wrath against the Stars and Stripes seems to us now
astounding, but it was all too common then.
This extreme bitterness, early in 1861, began to manifest itself against
the Germans of the city, who, as we have already noted, with hardly an
exception were openly and stoutly opposed to secession. Those who
favored the Southern Confederacy seldom if ever called them Germans, but
usually denominated them, “the Dutch.” The intense contempt which, by
the tone of their voices, they injected into that simple phrase, “the
Dutch,” was marvellous. And this scorn for our German fellow-citizens
was especially manifested by the gentler sex. The secession women,
belonging to the best society of the city, often poured out their
vituperation on the loyal Germans. At parties and receptions, more than
once I heard them hotly denounce the Germans as Amsterdam Dutch without
the Amster. This was shocking then, it is almost unbelievable now.
But even this pales before the irate utterance of a woman, who lived
hardly a block from my own door. A few weeks after the battle of
Wilson’s Creek, the body of General Lyon, who fell on that well-fought
field, was being borne through the city on its way for burial in his
native State of Connecticut. Some one said to this woman: “The hearse
with the body of General Lyon is coming down the street;” to which in a
flash she responded, “Good! if I had a piece of his liver, I’d fry it
and eat it.” Nobody but a woman could have compressed so much gall into
so few words. Shakespeare, who sounded the depths of woman’s soul, and
understood her power of passion as no other English writer ever did, in
his “Much Ado about Nothing,” put into the mouth of “Sweet Beatrice,” as
she raged against Claudio, “O God, that I were a man! I would eat his
heart in the market place.” What the prince of dramatists in imagination
attributed to woman, we saw in real life in St. Louis, in 1861.
If now in what we further relate in illustration of the bitterness of
feeling which for a season was manifested in our city, we shall find
amid the grave and solemn conflicts of civil war much that is ludicrous
and laughable, we must not forget, that by a merciful Providence this
tended to lighten burdens that otherwise might have been insupportable;
that the grave and the gay, the sad and mirth-provoking, the sublime and
the ridiculous often keep very close company, and that we are
responsible neither for the facts, nor for the strange juxtapositions in
which at times they presented themselves.
Into the two words, abolitionist and Yankee, a genuine Southerner and
secessionist, by his intonation and emphasis, condensed an amazing
amount of bitterness. To hurl either epithet at some despised Northerner
was the climax of vituperation. Nothing could be, nothing needed to be,
added. And such objurgation, harmless to the recipient, was often freely
indulged in, in our city.
I sat one morning in the study of Rev. G. J. Johnson, D. D., pastor of a
Baptist church on Sixth Street, when a Kentuckian came in to see us. In
a moment we saw that he was an ardent, impulsive soul. Without a break,
for some time he talked right on about the war and those who were
conducting the government. With rare volubility he denounced the
Yankees; but soon checked himself for a moment and asked if we were
Yankees? We assured him that we were not; so he went on with his bitter
tirade against the hated and despised Yankees. At last he stopped,
apparently to take breath, and asked, “Where were you born?” We replied
that we were both born and brought up in western New York. “Western New
York!” he excitedly exclaimed, “Western New Yorkers are the meanest kind
of Yankees!” We greeted his discourteous declaration with a peal of
laughter. At which he blushed, and, partially infected by our merriment,
with a smile, but without an apology, bade us good day.
In my church and congregation were two bright, attractive Southern
women. In sentiment however they were politically divided; one was for
secession, the other was for the Union. In January, 1861, the latter, in
some way, discovered that she was a distant relative of Mr. Lincoln.
Thereupon she visited Springfield, and called upon him. He heartily
urged her to spend several days under his roof. She was delighted to
accept this cordial invitation, and was charmed with her new-found blood
relation. She returned to St. Louis full of enthusiasm for the President
elect, and embraced every fitting opportunity to lavish upon him her
praises. By chance she and the other woman of opposite political
sentiment, of whom I have spoken above, making a social call, met,
without any collusion, in my parlor. The conversation soon drifted into
a discussion of the ominous events which were then agitating all minds.
Very soon Mr. Lincoln was spoken of and the lady who favored secession
called him a clown and a mountebank. This brought her Southern friend,
who was a Unionist, to his defence. Her words had in them no tinge of
bitterness, but they were positive and cordial. She said that Mr.
Lincoln was a relative of hers, a warm personal friend, that she had
recently spent, by his urgent invitation, ten days in his house, and
that he was no clown; if she had ever met a kind, warm-hearted gentleman
he was one. To hear Mr. Lincoln so warmly eulogized as a gentleman, and
that by a Southern woman, was a little more than the secession lady
could endure. She burst into tears, and said in broken accents,
“I—can—never speak—to you again.” She rose to depart. Confounded by this
unexpected explosion of spleen, and hardly knowing whether I was at home
or somewhere else, I managed to help my tearful friend to the door,
where, as politely as I could, I bade her good day. She did not respond.
Her choking emotions forbade it. With her handkerchief to her eyes, she
went sobbing down the street, because one of her own dear friends had,
in the most lady-like manner, declared that Mr. Lincoln was not a clown.
But the unseemly virulence of some prompted them to deeds of violence.
In the autumn of 1861, a young Southern fire-eater appeared one morning
on Fourth Street before the Planters’ Hotel, with a loaded revolver. He
flourished it around and above his head, boasting that as soon as he
should get a sight of Frank Blair, he would shoot him. A gentleman who
heard his braggadocio felt keenly solicitous for Mr. Blair’s safety.
Just then he caught sight of him on Fourth Street, about a square and a
half north of the hotel. Hastening to him, he reported what the hot
Southerner had just said, and pointed out to him his would-be murderer.
Mr. Blair was a tall, well-proportioned, vigorous man. He was among the
bravest of the brave. He never feared the face of clay. That chilly
morning he wore an overcoat with a cape. He at once threw the cape
across his breast and over his shoulder, and, to the consternation of
the friend, who had warned him of his imminent danger, walked directly
to the hotel, before which, with loaded revolver in hand, stood the
swaggerer, who, a few minutes before, had so loudly threatened to take
his life. Mr. Blair went past him, came within six feet of him, looked
him in the eye, but the poltroon did not shoot. He found it easier to
boast than to act. The piercing glance of his enemy cooled his heated
passion and made him a shivering coward. When Mr. Blair reached the
street south of the hotel, he turned on his heel and walked back, and
once more brushing by his cowed foe went on his way unhurt.
But even in the fair sex, bitterness sometimes manifested itself with
bloody intent. A lady who lived only a few rods from my door told me one
day that she intended to shoot Frank Blair. Mr. Blair was intensely
hated by Southerners for his pronounced free-soil views, and on account
of the leading part he was taking in saving Missouri from the madness of
secession. The more malignant disunionists determined if possible to put
him out of the way. It was more than once whispered that in due time he
would be assassinated. And here was a lady that was aspiring for the
honor of shedding his blood. Just why she so frankly declared her
intention to me, I could never understand. However, we were well
acquainted with each other, and she, knowing how warmly I contended for
the Union, evidently meant to annoy me by declaring her fell purpose.
Nevertheless, I made light of it, and said to her, “I don’t think Mr.
Blair will suffer much from you.” “Ah!” she replied, “I have a revolver,
and I am practising with it every day in the back yard and have already
become a good shot.” “Still,” I said, “I don’t think you will seriously
injure him.” She responded, “You will see pretty soon.” And sure enough
her opportunity for doing that meditated deed of blood soon came.
We have already noted the fact that when Lyon took Camp Jackson, he
divided his force and sent different detachments of it along different
routes, all converging on the encampment in Lindell’s Grove. A regiment
of artillery went through Chestnut Street, on which this lady of bloody
intent lived. Mr. Blair rode on horseback at the head of it. The street
was not very wide. He sat majestically on his horse. He was a splendid
target, enticing to any one who longed to shoot him. The house in which
our lady lived had at the second story an iron balcony on which French
windows opened. Some one said to her, “Frank Blair is coming.” She
seized her loaded revolver. She panted to become famous, and saw not
that at the same time, if she carried out her purpose, she would become
infamous. She grasped and turned the knob of the window; it swung back
on its hinges into the room; she put one foot out upon the balcony;
Blair was now nearly abreast of her, and only a few feet from her; just
behind him was a battery of artillery; this was the first time that she
had seen the brazen throats of cannon. Did she fire at that living
target on horseback? She utterly failed to act the assassin; the sight
of those six and eight pounders sent the blood from her head to her
heart; things went swirling around her; she faintly whispered “Oh! Oh!”
and fell back into the room in a dead faint. Blair rode on all
unconscious of his feminine foe, while the members of her family, with
cold water and hartshorn, anxiously labored to restore her to
consciousness. She at last opened her eyes, a sadder but wiser woman.
During the years of the war that followed, her neighbors, when they
greeted her, often asked, “And how is Frank Blair?” Just how we then
made merry over intended murder, it is now difficult to explain. The
lady of whom I write would have been shocked to have heard it so
characterized. She simply meditated the deed of a patriotic heroine. But
after her vaunted violence ended in a faint she seemed to lose all
interest in the war. The sight of a few brass field pieces drove out of
her forever all bitterness of spirit.
Belonging to the Presbyterian Church at the corner of Eighth and Locust
Streets was a good deacon by the name of Tucker. He was editor of an
evening paper. Believing with all his heart in the righteousness of
secession, and wishing both in season and out of season, to strike
telling blows against all advocates of Unionism, he came out in an
editorial, one Saturday evening, in which he said: “The devil preaches
at the corner of Sixth and Locust Streets, and he is just the same sort
of a being that he was more than eighteen hundred years ago; he wants
everybody to bow down and worship him.” Now since that was just where I
preached, the editorial was rather personal, and was intended to be
offensive. The deacon, fearing that I might miss reading his highly
complimentary words, and so lack the stimulus that they might impart to
my Sunday ministrations, early on the morning of the Lord’s day, sent a
copy of his paper to me by special messenger, having thoughtfully marked
his amiable editorial with his blue pencil. Instead of demanding
satisfaction of the pious editor as almost any hot-blooded Southerner of
that day would have done, the blue-penciled editorial was read at my
breakfast-table amid roars of laughter.
The good deacon a little while after left St. Louis, became a member of
Claybourn F. Jackson’s political family, fled with the Governor and his
staff to Arkansas and printed the proclamations of the discarded,
peripatetic government of Missouri, as it wandered here and there in
exile. About two years thereafter he died and, by the special permit of
the general in command of the department of Missouri, was buried from
the church where for many years he had filled the office of deacon. He
was an honest, earnest soul, striving according to his light to do his
duty.
Moreover, it fell to my lot not only to be at times the subject of
objurgation in secession newspapers, but the enemies of the Union also
honored me by threatening to take my life. On a June morning of 1861, a
gentleman accosted me at the Post-office, whither I had gone for my
morning mail, and with pardonable inquisitiveness and much earnestness
asked if I went out nights. I assured him that I did. He then urgently
advised me not to do so, saying that he knew that a plot had been laid
to kill me. I answered that I had very important duties as a Christian
pastor, and when in order to perform them it was necessary for me to go
out in the evening, I must go regardless of consequences to myself.
Although a stranger to me, he declared himself to be a friend, and that
he said what he did out of personal solicitude for me. He wished to know
if I were not afraid. I assured him that I had not the slightest
consciousness of fear; and that come life or death I proposed to stand
at my post and do my duty. He went his way and I went mine. Soon it
occurred to me that I did not ask his name, and who my solicitous friend
was I never learned.
Very soon thereafter a neighboring pastor called upon me, and with
evident anxiety which expressed itself both in his words and in the tone
of his voice, detailed what he had heard about the planned assassination
of myself. He thought that I was in imminent danger and that perhaps it
might be best for me to leave the State. I replied that I suspected that
some of these gruesome stories had been invented to frighten me from my
post; and, if that was the design, the authors of them had missed their
mark. As for myself I had no apprehension of any special danger, and I
had settled the question as to what course I should take; it was my
unalterable purpose to go right on in the discharge of my duties as a
minister of the gospel and as a citizen of Missouri and of the United
States, if the heavens fell. What the foundation of these murderous
rumors was I never attempted to discover. Society in the city was
wrenched from its moorings, and was tempest-tossed. That some cherished
wild and bloody purposes was only too evident. Now and then a citizen,
under the darkness of night, was done to death in the street, and they
who did the deed of blood were never discovered. Men’s minds were filled
with apprehension. Their imaginations were weirdly active. No human mind
fully understood the situation; none but the divine mind could fathom
and comprehend it. No man could see the dangers that stealthily lurked
by his pathway; then as ever there was only one safe thing for any true
man to do, trust in God and fearlessly do his duty as he saw it day by
day.
In November of 1861, General Halleck took forcible possession of the
main rendezvous of the secessionists of the city and seized the arms,
furniture, books and papers that were found there. One book among others
stirred up no little excitement. In it were several pages of names of
our citizens. One column of names was written in red ink, the rest in
black. Upon investigation it was ascertained that it was the declared
purpose of the disloyal, who made the place their headquarters, when the
city should be taken by the Confederates, to seize those whose names
were written in red and, without trial, hang them from the nearest
lamp-post or telegraph-pole; while those whose names were written in
black were to be thrown into prison and tried by court martial. At the
head of the red list stood the flaming name of Frank P. Blair. Beneath
his many of us were permitted to read our names upon that blood-red roll
of honor.
The instances of malignity now noted by us are but a few among many.
Still such bitterness was far from being universal. There seemed to be
comparatively little of it among the loyal. They were resolute, but not
often virulent. They were animated by confident hope. Few of them, after
Camp Jackson was taken, ever believed that Missouri would secede. They
however saw the need of constant vigilance. They coped with an able foe;
but feeling that their star was in the ascendant, they gave themselves
largely to works of charity, generously meeting the wants of both
friends and foes. On the other hand, the cause of the disloyal was
clearly on the wane. The fact was so evident that they were often in a
state of desperation. In such trying circumstances some of them gave way
to blind passion. Their better natures were overborne and some of them
expressed their pent up bitterness in hot, hasty words, or in despicable
deeds; still a large majority of them, in all the stress of the hour,
cherished and manifested a kindly spirit. But it has been necessary for
us, in order faithfully to depict society as it was in St. Louis during
the war, to present some of the many sad and startling exhibitions of
bitterness.