a member of a prominent Kentucky family, who had come to Springfield
in 1839 to live with her sister, Mrs. Ninian W. Edwards. The house in
which she spent the three years before her marriage was one of the
handsomest in the town, and was a centre of social gayety. Mr. and
Mrs. Edwards opposed the marriage to the poor and plebeian lawyer;
they urged the folly of exchanging a cultured home for the
surroundings to which Lincoln would take her. But she knew her own
mind, and she went with Lincoln to the home he provided for her.
The character of the accommodations to which he took his bride is
revealed by a letter written in May, 1843: "We are not keeping house,
but boarding at the Globe Tavern.... Boarding only costs four dollars
a week."
But the day came when the young statesman was able to open for Mrs.
Lincoln the door of their own modest one-story house. Later a second
story was added under the direction of his wife, most of the work
being done while he was away from home, riding the circuit.
J. G. Holland's pleasing picture of life in the home during the years
from 1850 to 1860 should be remembered:
"It was to him a time of rest, of reading, of social
happiness, and of professional prosperity. He was already a
father, and took an almost unbounded delight in his children.
The most that he could say to any rebel in his household was,
'You break my heart, when you act like this.' A young man
bred in Springfield speaks of a vision that has clung to his
memory very vividly.... His way to school led by the lawyer's
door. On almost any fair summer morning he could find Mr.
Lincoln on the sidewalk in front of his house, drawing a
child backward and forward, in a child's gig. Without hat or
coat, and wearing a pair of rough shoes, his hands behind him
holding on to the tongue of the gig, and his tall form bent
forward to accommodate himself to the service, he paced up
and down the walk forgetful of everything around him. The
young man says he remembers wondering how so rough and plain
a man should live in so respectable a house."
Once Lincoln was sitting on the porch when three-year-old Willie
escaped from the bathtub, ran out cf the house and the gate, up the
street, and into a field. There his father caught him, and carried
him home on his shoulder.
The children liked to ride on his shoulder, and they clambered for the
position. If they could not get there, they contented themselves with
hanging to his coat tails. One day a neighbor heard the boys crying,
and asked what was the matter. "Just what's the matter with the whole
world," was Lincoln's reply. "I've got three walnuts, and each wants
two."
During the last day of the Republican Convention of 1860, which was in
session in Chicago, Lincoln was in the office of the Springfield
_Journal_, receiving word of the progress of events. A messenger came
in and said to him, "The Convention has made a nomination, and Mr.
Seward is--the second man on the list!" After reading the telegram,
and receiving the congratulations of all in the office, Lincoln spoke
of the little woman on Eighth Street who had some interest in the
matter, and said he would go home and tell her the news.
When the news became generally known, the citizens followed him to the
house on Eighth Street. In the evening, after a meeting in the State
House, the Republicans present marched to the Lincoln home. The
nominee made a speech, and invited as many as could get in to enter
the house. "After the fourth of March we will give you a larger
house," came the laughing response.
Next day Lincoln was in a quandary. Some of his friends had sent him a
present of wines and other liquors, that he might be able to give what
they thought would be appropriate refreshment to the Committee sent
from Chicago to notify the nominee. Before the formal notification,
Lincoln asked the members what he should do with the wine. J. G.
Holland says that "the chairman at once advised him to return the
gift, and to offer no stimulants to his guests."
A few years later, when he had closed the house which he was never to
enter again, he said to his friends, who had gathered at the train to
say good-bye:
"My friends: no one, not in my situation, can appreciate my
feeling of sadness at this parting. To this place, and the
kindness of these people, I owe everything. Here I have lived
a quarter of a century, and have passed from a young to an
old man. Here my children have been born, and one is buried.
I now leave, not knowing when or whether ever I may return,
with a task before me greater than that which rested upon
Washington. Without the assistance of that Divine Being who
ever attended him, I cannot succeed. With that assistance I
cannot fail. Trusting in Him, who can go with me, and remain
with you, and be everywhere for good, let us confidently hope
that all will yet be well. To His care commending you, as I
hope in your prayers you will commend me, I bid you an
affectionate farewell."
When the body of the martyred President was brought back to
Springfield on May 3, 1865, it was not taken to the old home on Eighth
Street, but to the State Capitol, and from there to Oak Ridge
Cemetery.
The house is now the property of the State of Illinois, the gift of
Robert T. Lincoln, Abraham Lincoln's son.
[Illustration: WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON'S HOUSE, VINCENNES, IND.
_Photo furnished by Frank H. Curtis, Vincennes_
See page 376]
LXXXV
THE GOVERNOR'S PALACE AT VINCENNES, INDIANA
WHERE "OLD TIPPECANOE" WELCOMED HIS GUESTS
William Henry Harrison, son of Benjamin Harrison, one of the signers
of the Declaration of Independence, was a ward of Robert Morris. The
great financier opposed the young man's purpose to enlist in the Ohio
campaign against the Indians that followed the war of the Revolution,
but when young Harrison applied directly to Washington he was
appointed ensign and sent to the front. This was in 1791, and the new
ensign was but nineteen years old.
Gallant conduct during a campaign of four years under General Anthony
Wayne brought to him promotion to a captaincy, the favor of his
general, and the command of Fort Washington, at what is now
Cincinnati, Ohio.
This post was resigned in 1798, when there seemed no further prospect of
active service. Thereupon Washington appointed the twenty-four-year-old
captain Secretary of the Northwestern Territory and _ex officio_
Lieutenant Governor. When, in 1800, the Northwestern Territory was
divided, he was nominated by Thomas Jefferson Governor of Indiana
Territory, including what is now Indiana, Illinois, Michigan,
Wisconsin, and Iowa.
Vincennes, one of the three white settlements in all this vast
territory, became the seat of government. As Fort Sackville Vincennes
had been made famous during the Revolution by the brilliant exploit
of George Rogers Clarke, who took it from the British after an
approach across Illinois and through the flooded valley of the Wabash,
for which he will ever be remembered by a grateful country.
For thirteen years he was the autocrat in his remote outpost. To him
were committed, in company with the Judge, all legislative powers; he
was commander-in-chief of the militia, and he had the power of
treaty-making with the Indians. His signature became a valid title to
lands in the Indian country. His care of the interests committed to
him was so satisfactory that the legislature of Indiana asked for his
reappointment. He was especially successful in dealing with the
Indians. The victory at Tippecanoe became a rallying cry when, in
1839, he was nominated for the Presidency.
One of the most notable events of his career as Governor took place
before his house at Vincennes. The Indian warrior Tecumseh, claiming
that lands ceded by other tribes belonged to his own tribe, threatened
vengeance on any who should attempt to settle on these lands. General
Harrison sent for him, promising to give him a careful hearing and
full justice. Accordingly, in August, 1810, Tecumseh came to
Vincennes, accompanied by several hundred warriors. The meeting of the
Governor and the Indians took place in front of the official
residence. At one point in the conference, Tecumseh, being angry, gave
a signal to his warriors, who seized their knives, tomahawks, and war
clubs and sprang to their feet.
The Governor rose calmly from his armchair, drew his sword, and faced
the savage. His bearing overawed the Indians, and when he told
Tecumseh that he could have no further conference with such a bad
man, the chief and his supporters returned to their camp.
The house that looked down on this scene was probably the first house
of burned brick built west of the Alleghenies. It was erected in 1804,
at a cost of about twenty thousand dollars.
The walls of the basement are twenty-four inches thick; the upper
walls are eighteen inches thick. The outer walls are of hard red
brick. The doors, sash, mantels, and stairs are of black walnut, and
are said to have been made in Pittsburgh.
The basement contains the dining-room, the kitchen, in which hangs the
old-fashioned crane, a storeroom in which the supplies of powder and
arms were kept, and four servants' bedrooms. At one side of the large
cellar is the entrance to a tunnel which led to the banks of the
Wabash, some six hundred feet distant. This was built, so tradition
says, that the Governor and his family, if too closely pressed by
Indians, might escape to the river and continue their flight in
canoes. This would be useful also for the carrying in of water and
food during a siege.
On the first floor a commodious hallway communicates on the left with
the Council Chamber, where notable visitors were received. This was
also the chamber of early territorial lawmakers. Here, in 1805, by
Rev. Thomas Clelland, was preached the first Presbyterian sermon in
what is now the State of Indiana.
In the shutter of a room facing the rear is the mark of a bullet
which, it is said, was fired by an Indian who was attempting the life
of the Governor, while that official was walking the floor with his
little son in his arms.
To-day the house is cut off from the city by railroad tracks and is
surrounded by factories. Until 1916 it was owned by the Vincennes
Water Company, which proposed to raze it to the ground, that they
might have room for extension. Learning of this purpose, six members
of the Francis Vigo Chapter of the Daughters of the American
Revolution begged the City Council to buy the house and preserve it.
When the Council announced that the way was not open to do this, a
number of patriotic women, led by Mrs. Frank W. Curtis, raised the sum
necessary for the purchase of the property.
Under the direction of the Francis Vigo Chapter, the house has been
restored, and opened for visitors. It is the intention to maintain it
for the inspiration of those who visit Vincennes to look on the scene
of the wise labors of the first Governor of the Indian Territory.
[Illustration: RUFUS PUTNAM'S HOUSE, MARIETTA, O.
_Photo furnished by Miss Willia D. Cotton, Marietta_
See page 377]
LXXXVI
THE HOUSE OF GENERAL RUFUS PUTNAM, MARIETTA, OHIO
THE MAN WHO LED THE FIRST PERMANENT SETTLERS TO OHIO
In 1775 General Washington decided that he must fortify Dorchester
Heights, Boston, if he was to force the British to leave the country.
But how was he to do this? The ground was frozen to a depth of
eighteen inches, and the enemy's cannon commanded the coveted
position. Lieutenant Colonel Putnam told the General that the
seemingly impossible task could be performed. Washington was dubious,
but he had learned that Colonel Putnam was to be counted on. One
night, after dark, the work was begun, and before daylight it was so
far completed that the surprised enemy were compelled to retire.
In recognition of services like this, Colonel Putnam was made a
brigadier general. A reward even greater was his; he won the lasting
friendship of Washington.
Eight years after the fortification of Dorchester Heights, two hundred
and eighty-three officers asked Congress for a grant of land in the
western country. General Putnam forwarded the petition to Washington,
and urged that it be granted, in order that "the country between Lake
Erie and the Ohio might be filled with inhabitants, and the faithful
subjects of the United States so established on the waters of the Ohio
and on the lakes as to banish forever the idea of our western
territory falling under the dominion of any European power."
Action by Congress was delayed. On June 2, 1784, Washington wrote to
Putnam:
"I wish it was in my power to give you a more favorable
account of the officers' petition for lands on the Ohio and
its water, than I am about to do.... For surely if justice
and gratitude to the army, and general policy of the Union
were to govern in the case, there would not be the smallest
interruption in granting the request."
Putnam did not lose heart. His next step, taken in January, 1786, was
to call a meeting of officers and soldiers and others to form an Ohio
Company. The meeting was held at the Bunch of Grapes Tavern, in
Boston, March 1, 1786, and the Ohio Company of Associates was duly
formed. It was agreed to raise a fund to purchase from Congress, for
purposes of settlement, the western lands which Congress had been
asked to give them.
On July 27, 1787, a tract of 1,500,000 acres on the Ohio River,
between the Scioto and the Muskingum rivers, was sold to the Company
at sixty-six and two-thirds cents per acre. Half the amount was paid
down. When, later, it became impossible to pay the remainder, Congress
gave a measure of relief.
The first emigrants to go to the new lands set out from Danvers,
Massachusetts, December 1, 1787, under the guidance of General Rufus
Putnam, while a second party started from Hartford, Connecticut,
January 1, 1788. The first party of twenty-two men followed the Indian
trail over the Allegheny Mountains and reached the Youghiogheny River,
on January 23, 1788, while the second party of twenty-eight men,
making better time, joined them on February 14. Then a barge, called
the _Mayflower_, was built, forty-six feet long and twelve feet wide.
A cabin was provided for the women of the party, and an awning was
stretched. The men propelled the boat with ten oars.
On April 1 the voyage to the Ohio was begun, and on April 7 the party
reached the mouth of the Muskingum. The barge was moored to the bank,
opposite Fort Harmar. Thus came the Massachusetts pioneers to the town
of which Washington wrote later: "No colony in America was ever
settled under such favorable auspices as that which has just commenced
at Muskingum. Information, property, and strength will be its
characteristics. I know many of the settlers personally, and there
never were men better calculated to promote the welfare of such a
community."
Here the pioneers laid out the town of Marietta among the famous
Indian mounds, naming it in honor of Marie Antoinette of France. The
greatest mound of all was made the central feature of Marie Antoinette
Square. This mound is thirty feet high, while the circular base is 375
feet in circumference. It is surrounded by a moat fifteen feet wide
and five feet deep. Beyond the moat is a parapet twenty feet thick and
385 feet in circumference. This square was leased to General Putnam
for twelve years, on condition that he "surround the whole square with
mulberry trees with an elm at each corner." The base of the mound was
to be encircled with weeping willows, and evergreens were to be placed
on the mound. The parapet was to be surrounded with trees, the square
was to be seeded down to grass, and the whole was to be enclosed with
a post and rail fence. This effort to create a park at the very
beginning was an unusual feature of this pioneer experience.
An enclosure of logs, with a log fort at each corner, was built for
protection against the Indians. Between the corner forts were the
cabins occupied by the various families. The forts and the enclosure
were named the Campus Martius. One of the early houses built within
this stockade became the home of General Putnam.
Marie Antoinette Square soon became known as Mound Square. General
Putnam turned over his lease to the town, which set the property aside
as a cemetery. Many of the settlers had died during two epidemics of
smallpox, and there was need of a cemetery nearer the town than the
ground set aside at the beginning.
It is claimed that more officers of the Revolution have been buried in
the Mound Cemetery than in any other cemetery in the country. There
were twelve colonels, twelve majors, and twenty-two captains among
the Marietta pioneers. When General Lafayette was in Marietta in
1825, the list was read to him, and he said: "I knew them all. I saw
them at Brandywine, Yorktown, and Rhode Island. They were the bravest
of the brave."
Over Putnam's grave is the following inscription:
Gen. Rufus Putnam
A Revolutionary Officer
And the leader of the
Colony which made the
First settlement in the
Territory of the Northwest.
Born April 9, 1738
Died May 4, 1824.
The house occupied by "the Father of Ohio," as he has been called, is
preserved as a historical monument. In 1917 the Daughters of the
American Revolution and Marietta succeeded in persuading the Ohio
Legislature to pass a bill making provision for its repair and care.
LXXXVII
MONUMENT PLACE, ELM GROVE, WEST VIRGINIA
THE PLANTATION HOME OF TWO MAKERS OF HISTORY
At Shepherdstown, the oldest town in what is now West Virginia, Moses
Shepherd was born on November 11, 1763. His grandfather had founded
the town.
When Moses was about seven years old his father, Colonel Shepherd,
removed his large family to his plantation between Big Wheeling and
Little Creek, which is now included within the limits of Elm Grove. On
the banks of the creek he built Fort Shepherd, that the settlers for
miles around might have a place of refuge from the Indians. Of this
fort Colonel Shepherd was in command till it was destroyed by the
Indians in 1777. The family was hastily removed to Fort Henry, nearer
the present site of Wheeling. There they were hard pressed by the
Indians. Moses, along with other children, assisted in the defence by
moulding bullets and carrying ammunition.
Word went out to the neighboring strongholds of the endangered
settlers at Fort Henry. Captain John Boggs, then at Catfish Camp (now
Washington, Pennsylvania), hurried to the assistance of Colonel
Shepherd with forty armed men. With him was his daughter, Lydia, who
took her place with Moses and the other young people as an assistant
to the defenders.
She was there when Molly Scott made her sally from the fort in search
of shot, and she saw the heroine bring it in in her apron. She
witnessed also the attempt of Major Samuel McColloch to enter the fort
at the head of a squad of men which he had brought from Fort Van
Meter, a few miles away. With joy she saw the men enter the gate of
the fort, and her heart was in her mouth when she saw that McColloch,
who was her cousin, was unable to follow because the Indians had
managed to get between him and the gate. At last the gate was closed,
lest the Indians gain entrance, and the gallant Major was left to his
fate.
The Indians thought they could capture him easily. They hemmed him on
Wheeling Hill, on three sides. On the fourth side was a rocky
precipice almost sheer, covered with growth of trees and bushes. But
the savages were not to have such an easy victory after all, for Major
McColloch urged his horse over the brow of the steep hill, and, to the
astonishment of all, slipped, slid, and fell to the bottom, where the
way across the creek and to safety was comparatively easy.
The Indians were finally driven away, but not until Moses Shepherd had
made the acquaintance of Lydia Boggs, his companion in service at the
fort. They were married later. In 1798, after the death of Colonel
David Shepherd, Colonel Moses Shepherd took her to the palatial new
home built on the site of the second Fort Shepherd, near the banks of
Wheeling Creek. This house, which was called at first the Shepherd
Mansion or the Stone House, later became known as the Monument Place.
The story of the third name, which still persists, is interesting.
When, during Jefferson's administration, certain farsighted statesmen
advocated the building of a National Highway which should connect
Washington with Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, Colonel Shepherd became
one of the earnest and influential advocates of the road. He was a
friend of Henry Clay, to whose indefatigable advocacy of the road was
due much of the success of the venture. Clay was frequently a guest of
the Shepherds, and in the stately stone house he talked with them
about the difficulties, progress, and final triumph.
When the road was an accomplished fact Colonel and Mrs. Shepherd
caused to be built on the lawn a stone monument dedicated to their
friend, in appreciation of his service. The monument, whose
inscriptions have become illegible, is in plain sight from the
Cumberland Road, or, as it came to be called, the National Road, just
before it makes a sharp turn to cross the sturdy stone bridge over
Little Wheeling Creek. Possibly this was one of the bridges Colonel
Shepherd constructed. At any rate he was a contractor for a section of
the road, and several bridges were erected by him.
Along the Cumberland Road, which was the great highway between the
East and the West, travelled home-seekers outward bound and business
men and politicians to whom Washington beckoned irresistibly. Among
the regular travellers at this and later periods were Andrew Jackson,
William Henry Harrison, General Houston, James K. Polk, and others who
made it a point never to pass the Shepherd Mansion without stopping.
One of the early politicians who frequented the house, attracted there
by Mrs. Shepherd, said: "She had a powerful intellect in her younger
days. Many of our caucuses were held in her drawing-room. She could
keep a secret better than most women, but her love of sarcasm and
intrigue kept her from being very effective."
Mrs. Shepherd, in fun, had criticisms to offer of some of her
visitors. Once she spoke of Burton, Clay, and Webster as "those young
men, promising, but crude, crude."
She was accustomed to go every winter with her husband to Washington,
where she would spend a few months during the season. They always
travelled in a coach and four and they lived in great style at the
Capital. There she was sought for her beauty, for her eccentricities,
and her familiarity with private political life.
Colonel Shepherd died in 1832. In 1833 Mrs. Shepherd married General
Daniel Cruger, a New York Congressman, who spent the last years of
his life in West Virginia.
After the General's death in 1843 Mrs. Cruger lived at Monument Place,
receiving visitors as of old, and increasing in the eccentricities
that kept any one from being her warm admirer. Always she proved
herself an unusual woman. "If fate had placed her in the compressed
centre of a court, instead of in the inconsequent hurly-burly of a
republic, she would have made for herself a great place in history,"
Mrs. Rebecca Harding Davis once wrote of her.
She was still managing a large plantation during the Civil War, when a
visitor dropped in to see her who has left the following picture of
what she saw:
"We saw a well-built house of dressed stone, very large and
solid, with the usual detached kitchen and long row of 'negro
quarters.' ...
"Mrs. Cruger's age was told by the skin of face and hands,
which were like crumpled parchment, but the lips were firm
and the eyes, deep set in wrinkled lids, were still dark and
keen. She was then one hundred years old.
"We went up to see the ball-room, which was across the whole
front of the house, with many windows and a handsome carved
marble mantel at each end, and deep closets on both sides of
these fire-places.