[Illustration: MRS. ANNIE WITTENMYER,
First President Woman’s National Christian Temperance Union.]
HISTORY
OF THE
WOMAN’S TEMPERANCE
CRUSADE.
A Complete Official History of the Wonderful Uprising of the Christian
Women of the United States against the Liquor Traffic, which
culminated in the Gospel Temperance Movement.
BY MRS. ANNIE WITTENMYER.
AUTHOR OF “WOMAN’S WORK FOR JESUS,” “A JEWELED
MINISTRY,” ETC.
INTRODUCTION
BY MISS FRANCES E. WILLARD.
[Illustration]
PUBLISHED BY
JAMES H. EARLE,
178 WASHINGTON STREET,
BOSTON, MASS.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1882, by
MRS. ANNIE WITTENMYER,
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C.
BOSTON
W. F. BROWN AND COMPANY, PRINTERS
218 FRANKLIN STREET
TO
THE CHRISTIAN WOMEN,
_Who counted not their lives dear unto themselves, but followed
the Master into the Saloons, and Gambling Dens, and
homes of sin, and sorrow, and went joyfully
to prison for Christ’s sake_,
AND TO
THE WOMAN’S NATIONAL CHRISTIAN TEMPERANCE UNION,
THIS VOLUME
_IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED BY_
THE AUTHOR.
PREFACE.
This book is a carefully-prepared official history, of the wonderful
movement known as the Woman’s Temperance Crusade.
There has been no effort at literary excellence; yet many of the
thrilling experiences narrated in these pages in simple words, will
live in song and story as long as God and Truth are honored among the
children of men.
The women who walked with God in the fiery furnace of the Crusade have
been allowed as far as possible to tell of their work in their own
words, and they should be accorded a gracious hearing.
In this record there are glimpses of home life, “like apples of gold
in pictures of silver,” for these women are true home-makers; there
are scenes in churches where the awful solemnity is broken only by
the sobs of strong men, as women with lofty, heaven-born heroism, go
out as God’s chosen leaders in this holy war; there are scenes in the
streets, where bands of pure, true women, surrounded by a howling mob,
kneel in the snow, and with the light of the excellent glory on their
faces, pray as did their Master for just such another blaspheming,
mocking mob: “Father, forgive them, they know not what they do,” and
then out of the jaws of death, out of the mouth of hell, guided by an
invisible hand, sheltered by unseen wings, pass through the jeering,
filth-reeking, angry crowd, unharmed.
There are many things in this book that will tax the credulity of the
reader, but _the statements it contains are well-authenticated, and
must be accepted as facts_. Nothing, perhaps, could be more incredible
than the accounts, oft-repeated, of the base and cowardly indignities
heaped upon American women, in their own land, by foreigners, who were
protected in their outrages by the stars and stripes, for which many of
these women had given their husbands, sons and brothers.
The liquor traffic of this country is mainly in the hands of a low
class of foreigners, and they are responsible for all the mobs, and
nearly all the insults offered to the Christian women engaged in the
Crusade.
These pages have been prayerfully written, and the facts they contain
are earnestly commended to all who love God, and Truth, and Justice.
ANNIE WITTENMYER.
TABLE OF CONTENTS.
Page
INTRODUCTION 13
CHAPTER I.
The Outlook at the Beginning of the Crusade 25
The Nation Living on her own Vitals 28
A Calcium Light turned on the Liquor Traffic 32
OHIO.
CHAPTER II.
The Beginning of the Crusade in Ohio 34
Response to Dr. Lewis’ Appeal 36
Mrs. Thompson’s Story 37
The First Saloon Prayer-Meeting 40
A Saloon-Keeper in Tears 41
Battle with Dunn, the Druggist 42
A Lawyer Confounded by Prayer 43
Prayer answered after Fifty Years 48
Baptized in Whiskey 50
Victory at Washington Court-House 51
Kneeling in the Snow 52
A Furious Dutchman 56
Facing the Dealer and his Lawyer 59
Surrender of every Saloon 61
Wine banished from State Dinners in Ohio 63
The Work in Wilmington 64
A General Surrender 72
New Vienna 79
Kenton, Gallipolis, and Greenfield 84
Franklin 86
Morrow 87
Oxford 94
McArthur 95
Georgetown 96
Logan 98
McConnelsville 102
Marysville 103
Findley 105
Jamestown 111
Mount Vernon 112
Warren 115
Steubenville 118
Youngstown 119
Alliance 125
New Philadelphia 149
OHIO.
CHAPTER III.
Cleveland 152
Ladies Beaten by a Mob 154
A Mock Prayer-Meeting 156
Fierce Dogs subdued by Prayer 156
Millersburg 167
Zanesville 168
Painesville 170
Ladies Imprisoned in a Saloon 171
Ashland 175
Bellevue 176
Bucyrus 177
A Drunken Mob 190
Brutal Treatment of the Ladies by the Police 196
Arrest of the Ladies 203
Tried and Condemned 204
Elyria 206
Athens 215
Columbus 220
Indignities offered to the Ladies 221
Meeting in the State House 224
Van Wert 225
Cincinnati 228
A Crusade Dog 230
Meeting at the Esplanade 232
Cannon brought out 235
The Mayor knocked down by the Mob 238
Forty-three Ladies Arrested 240
The Story of the White Shoes and White Dresses 244
What a Picture did 248
Clyde 251
Cedarville 252
Marietta 255
Xenia 258
Waynesville 263
New Concord 267
Ravenna and Marion 273
West Union and Felicity 278
Lebanon 279
Grandville 280
Leesburg and Blanchester 282
Goshen, Zaleski, and Troy 282
Mansfield 283
Ripley 294
Tiffin 296
Bellefontaine 298
Springfield 301
Newark 310
Urbana 318
Dayton 323
Piqua 329
Circleville 330
Madisonville and Delaware 332
Portsmouth 334
Stryker 337
Chillicothe 339
INDIANA.
CHAPTER IV.
Shelbyville 341
Jeffersonville 348
Chestertown 356
Thorntown 363
Crawfordsville 366
Evansville 368
Madison 377
Indianapolis 391
Richmond 396
ILLINOIS.
CHAPTER V.
Chicago 399
Visit to the City Council 401
A Mob of Five or Six Thousand 402
Origin of the Daily Temperance Prayer-Meeting 405
Jacksonville 412
Rockford 417
Bloomington 421
Moline 424
WEST VIRGINIA.
CHAPTER VI.
Wheeling 442
Visit to Laramie’s Variety Theatre 444
Laramie’s Harangue 445
Visit to the Dancing Girls 447
Laramie’s Den Closed 448
Savegaut’s Brutal Treatment of the Ladies 449
A Dealer Checkmated 450
Captain Jack and Temperance 451
DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA. 452
A Saloon closed by the Judgments of God 455
Forgeries in obtaining Licenses 457
Securing the President’s Veto 458
Distinguished Paupers in the Poor-House 459
PENNSYLVANIA.
CHAPTER VII.
Pittsburgh 465
First Arrest of the Ladies 469
Their Acquittal 470
Rearrested and taken to Jail 471
A Mob--The Ladies Arrested the Third Time 472
Carried to the Court of Common Pleas 473
Acquitted--Singing and Praying not Unlawful 475
The Acting Mayor in the Penitentiary 476
Allegheny 478
Williamsport 482
Judgments meted out 484
Blossburg 487
Warren 488
Philadelphia 491
A Graduate of Yale Redeemed 498
God can Save a Tramp 499
A Marvellous Answer to Prayer 500
Montrose 504
Susquehanna and Troy 505
Ashley 506
NEW YORK.
CHAPTER VIII.
Fredonia 507
First Visit to Saloons 509
Auburn 511
Plattsburg 512
Albany 514
Syracuse 516
Rochester 518
Oswego 520
Hornellsville 525
Utica 527
Rome 531
New York City 533
A Scene to melt the hardest Heart 538
Meetings in a Dance-House 540
The Walls about New York City 543
Brooklyn 544
A Strange Telegram 546
A Man Redeemed 548
Every Saloon closed where they held Prayer-Meetings 551
Captain Oliver Cotter’s Conversion 553
The Wonderful Saloon Prayer-Meeting 554
Binghampton 557
Poughkeepsie 559
Geneva 563
Peekskill 565
VERMONT, NEW HAMPSHIRE, AND R. ISLAND.
CHAPTER IX.
VERMONT. 569
No Saloons in St. Johnsbury 570
Mechanics growing Rich 571
Schemes to evade the Law 572
St. Albans 573
NEW HAMPSHIRE.
Concord 575
Portsmouth 578
Presentation of Flags to Sailors 580
RHODE ISLAND. 581
Visiting the Saloons in Pawtucket 583
A Visit to the Legislature 585
The Ladies Victorious 586
Reform Club Movement 588
MASSACHUSETTS.
CHAPTER X.
Convention at Worcester 591
The Results of Work 592
Protest against Wine-Drinking at Public Dinners 594
Interview with the Mayor 595
Memorial of W. C. T. U. 596
The Response of the Mayor 598
Action of the City Council 604
MAINE.
Bangor 605
Petition to the City Council 606
Establishment of a Club and Reading-Room 607
Reformation of Dr. Henry A. Reynolds 608
Augusta 609
Stroudwater 611
Portland 614
Opening of a Friendly Inn 616
Flower and Diet Missions 617
Old Orchard 618
MICHIGAN.
CHAPTER XI.
Adrian 619
Lansing 625
Jackson 627
Grand Rapids 631
Cold Water and Eaton Rapids 633
New Boston 635
Portland 641
Howell 642
Allegan 643
Ionia 645
Hudson 647
Morenci 649
Flint 650
Leslie 651
Dowagiac 653
Colon 655
WISCONSIN, MINNESOTA, IOWA, AND MISSOURI.
CHAPTER XII.
WISCONSIN.
Ripon 657
Invitation to a Saloon 658
Praying in Underground Rooms 660
A Druggist driven away 662
Josh and the Election 663
Indignities offered 665
MINNESOTA 667
IOWA 668
Manchester 670
Wilton Junction 674
Villisca 677
Vinton 678
Clinton 680
MISSOURI 683
Carthage 684
CALIFORNIA AND OREGON.
CALIFORNIA 687
CHAPTER XIII.
Victory at Oakland 688
Mob at Alameda 689
A Reign of Terror 690
Sallie Hart Assailed 690
An Old Lady Insulted 691
Effigy of Sallie Hart Buried 692
German Liquor-Dealers Responsible 693
Statement of Rev. O. Gibson 695
Affidavit of Officer Krauth 697
OREGON 698
Visit to Moffett’s Saloon 699
An Irate German 700
Brutality of the Police 702
Mob at Moffett’s 703
Pistols, Knives, and Gongs 704
The Ladies Arrested 705
The Trial 706
Convicted 708
The Ladies Protest 709
Sent to Prison 710
Driven from the Jail 711
Encouraging Words 712
Murder in a Saloon 713
NEW JERSEY.
CHAPTER XIV.
Newark 716
The Drunken Engineer Saved 717
A Drunken Tailor Redeemed 718
A Miracle of Grace 719
Giving up Rum and Tobacco 720
Reform Club Organized 721
Delirium Tremens Cured 724
A Drunken Husband Reached 725
Roseville 727
Lambertville and Rahway 731
Jersey City 732
Mt. Holly and New Brunswick 733
Hackettstown 733
Trenton 734
MARYLAND 736
The Wail of Women and Children 737
Organization 738
State Convention 739
The English Sailor-Boy 740
Farewell Meeting for Mrs. Parker 741
Smallest of the Polished Stones 742
The Tryst of Maryland 743
CONNECTICUT.
New Milford 745
The Battle--License or No License 746
Eastford 748
Plainville 750
New Haven 754
Stafford 755
Ministers Stoned 756
Bridgeport 756
Hartford 758
DELAWARE 760
Visit to the Legislature 761
I made him what he was 762
A Dealer Confounded 763
Mass-Meetings at Wilmington 763
OUTLOOK AFTER THE CRUSADE.
CHAPTER XV.
The Watchword 764
The Pulpit 765
Sunday-Schools 765
International Medical Congress 766
Correspondence of W. C. T. U. 766
Views of Drs. Mussey and Rush 767
Answer of International Congress 768
Alcohol Ruled out of its cherished Place 769
Important Advancement 770
What the Crusade was 771
Relation of Foreign Emigration to the Liquor Traffic 771
Nationality of Dealers in Philadelphia 772
Nationality of Prisoners and Paupers 773
Outrages that stir Patriotic Blood 774
Political Corruption 775
The Bartender to Manage Election Matters 776
Sabbath Desecration 777
President Hayes’ View of the Bible 778
Personal Liberty 779
Hedged about by Law 780
Work, and Pray, and Wait 781
INTRODUCTION.
Ours is a famous country for protection. There is the tariff to protect
industry, while the patent laws are a safeguard to invention. There
are the land grants for railroads, subsidies for steamship companies,
charters for corporations. In many of the States we have societies for
the prevention of cruelty to animals, and in nearly all, laws for the
protection of game. Busy with all these gentle, wise, and patriotic
measures, there is one place our brothers have forgotten adequately to
protect, and that is--Home. The Women’s Temperance Crusade, embalmed
in the pages that follow, was a protest against this forgetfulness and
this neglect. It was the wild cry of the defenceless and despairing,
whose echo rose to Heaven and still resounds in every ear that is not
deaf. At the height of that wonderful uprising, a sweet-voiced Quaker
woman led her band to the chief saloon in an Ohio village. “What
business have you to come here?” roared the affrighted dealer. Going to
the bar she laid her Bible down and said: “Thee knows I had five sons
and twenty grandsons, and thee knows that many of them learned to drink
right in this place, and one went forth from here maddened with wine
and blew his brains out with a pistol ball; and can’t thee let his
mother lay her Bible on the counter whence her boy took up the glass,
and read thee what God says: ‘_Woe unto him that puts the bottle to his
neighbor’s lips?_’”
The saloon-keeper had but to point to the wall behind him, where hung
his “License to sell,” bearing the names of prominent citizens of the
village, and emblazoned with the escutcheon of the Commonwealth. They
all met in that little scene--Gospel and Law, man’s failure, woman’s
grief; while the reason why, and the place in which they met, gave
ample answer to the question heard so often: _What did the Crusade
mean?_
There is another question quite as often asked: _What did the Crusade
do?_ One of its leaders made this reply to the Temperance Sojourner,
who writes these lines: “Well, let me answer from my own experience.
Until it swept over our place, though I had lived there twenty years,
I knew so little about this drinking business that I couldn’t have
pointed out a saloon in the whole town. I thought the queer-looking
places with blinds and screens were barber-shops. Since then I
have found out that they are shops where men get shaved--not of
their beards, but of their honor. Since then, too, I took my little
four-year-old boy to market with me one morning, and feeling his clasp
of my hand tighten, I looked down and saw his head turned backward
apprehensively. ‘Why, Willie, what’s the matter?’ I exclaimed. There
were volumes of meaning in the reproachful roll of his solemn blue eyes
as he whispered: ‘Didn’t mamma know that her little boy was a-passin’
a saloon?’ Surely it was the crowning achievement of the Crusade that
it opened the eyes of millions of women and children in this land to
the existence and the dangers of the rum-shop. In consequence of this
the public finger points to-day with imperious gesture at the saloon,
and woman’s voice in tones of irresistible persuasion cries, ‘Look
there!’”
What did the Crusade do? Take another illustration. In front of a
saloon that had refused them entrance, knelt a crusading group. Their
leader was also the most prominent Methodist lady of the community.
Her head was crowned with the glory of gray hairs; her hands were
clasped, her sweet and gentle voice was lifted up in prayer. Around her
knelt the flower of all the churches of that city--Congregationalists,
Baptists, Presbyterians--many of whom had never worked outside their
own denominations until now. At the close, an Episcopal lady offered
the Lord’s prayer, in which joined Unitarians, Swedenborgians, and
Universalists; and when they had finished, a dear old lady in the
dove-colored garb of the Friends’ Society was moved to pray, while all
the time below them on the curbstone’s edge knelt Bridget with her
beads and her Ave Marie.
“Going out on the street” signified a good deal when one comes to think
about it. First of all, it meant stepping outside the denominational
fence, which, properly enough, surrounds one’s home. The Crusaders felt
that “unity of the Spirit” was the one essential, nor feared to join
hands with any who had the Bible and the temperance pledge for the two
articles in their “Confession of Faith”--who rallied to the tune of
“Rock of Ages cleft for me,” or had for their watchword: “Not willing
that any should perish.”
Best of all, “going out on the street” brought women face to face
with the world’s misery and sin. And here I may be pardoned a bit of
personal reminiscence. Never can I forget the day I met the great
unwashed, untaught, ungospelled multitude for the first time. Need I
say it was the Crusade that opened before me, as before ten thousand
other women, this wide, “effectual door?” It was in Pittsburgh, the
summer after the Crusade. Greatly had I wished to have a part in it,
but this one experience was my first and last of “going out with a
band.” A young teacher from the public schools, whose custom it was
to give an hour twice each week to crusading, walked arm-in-arm with
me. Two school-ma’ms together, we fell into the procession behind the
experienced campaigners. On Market street we entered a saloon the
proprietor of which, pointing to several men who were fighting in the
next room, begged us to leave, and we did so at once, amid the curses
of the bacchanalian group. Forming in line on the curbstone’s edge in
front of this saloon, we knelt, while an old lady, to whose son that
place had proved the gate of death, offered a prayer full of tenderness
and faith, asking God to open the eyes of those who, just behind that
screen, were selling liquid fire and breathing curses on his name. We
rose, and what a scene was there! The sidewalk was lined by men with
faces written all over and interlined with the record of their sin and
shame. Soiled with “the slime from the muddy banks of time,” tattered,
dishevelled, there was not a sneering look or a rude word or action
from any one of them. Most of them had their hats off; many looked
sorrowful; some were in tears; and standing there in the roar and
tumult of that dingy street, with that strange crowd looking into our
faces--with a heart stirred as never until now by human sin and shame,
I joined in the sweet gospel song:
“Jesus the water of life will give
Freely, freely, freely!”
Just such an epoch as that was in my life, has the Crusade proved to
a mighty army of women all over this land. Does anybody think that,
having learned the blessedness of carrying Christ’s gospel to those
who never come to church to hear the messages we are all commanded
to “Go, tell,” we shall ever lay down this work? Not until the genie
of the Arabian Nights crowds himself back into the fabulous kettle
whence he escaped by expanding his pinions in nebulous bars--not
until then! To-day and every day they go forth on their beautiful
errands--the “Protestant nuns” who a few years ago were among the
“anxious and aimless” of our crowded population, or who belonged to
trades and professions overfull--and with them go the women fresh from
the sacred home-hearth and cradle-side, wearing the halo of these
loving ministries. If you would find them, go not alone to the costly
churches which now welcome their voices, while to those who are “at
ease in Zion” they gently speak of the great, whitened harvest. But
go to blacksmith shop and billiard hall, to public reading-room and
depot waiting-room, to the North End in Boston, Water street, New
York, the Bailey coffee-houses of Philadelphia, the Friendly Inns of
Cleveland, the Woman’s Temperance Room of Cincinnati, and Lower Farwell
Hall, Chicago, and you will find the glad tidings declared by the new
“apostolic succession,” dating from the Pentecost of the Crusade.
There is another question often asked, to which this thought of woman’s
temperance work conducts us, viz.: _What is the Crusade doing now?_
Those who ask it with supercilious glance furnish an added illustration
of the immense power of the human mind to resist knowledge.
“John Brown’s body lies a-mouldering in the grave,
But his soul is marching on.”
Just so with the Crusade. It has come and it has gone--that whirlwind
of the Lord--but it has set forces in motion which each day become more
potent, and will sweep on until the rum power in America is overthrown.
There was but one Pentecost; doubtless history will record but one
Crusade.
A phenomenon no less remarkable, though certainly much less remarked,
has succeeded that wonderful uprising--indeed, is aptly termed its
sober, second thought. This is the phenomenon of _organization_. The
women who went forth by an impulse sudden, irresistible, divine, to
pray in the saloons, became convinced, as weeks and months passed by,
theirs was to be no easily-won victory. The enemy was rich beyond
their power to comprehend. He had upon his side the majesty of law,
the trickery of politics, and the leagued strength of that almost
invincible pair--Appetite, Avarice. He was persistent, too, as Fate.
He had determined to fight it out on that line to the last dollar of
his enormous treasure-house, and the last ounce of his power. But these
women of the Crusade believed in God, and in themselves as among his
appointed instruments for the destruction of the rum power. They loved
Christ’s cause; they loved the native land that had been so mindful of
them; they loved their sweet and sacred homes. And so it came about
that, though they had gone forth only as skirmishers, they soon fell
into line of battle; though they had innocently hoped to overcome the
enemy by a sudden assault, they buckled on the armor for the long
campaign. The Women’s Praying Bands, earnest, impetuous, inspired,
became the Women’s Temperance Unions, firm, patient, persevering.
The Praying Bands were without leadership save that which inevitably
results from the survival of the fittest; the Women’s Unions are
regularly officered. The first wrought their grand pioneer work in
sublime indifference to prescribed forms of procedure; “So say we,
all of us,” being the spirit of “motions” often “made, seconded and
carried” by the Chair, while the assembled women nodded their earnest
acquiescence; the second are possessed of good strong “Constitutions”
(with By-Laws annexed), and follow their “Order of Business” with a
dutiful regard to parliamentary usage. The Praying Bands, looking for
immediate deliverance, pressed their numbers into incessant service;
the Women’s Unions, aware that the battle is to be a long one, ask
their members only for such help as can be given consistently with
other duties. Enthusiasm--“a God in us”--enabled the Praying Bands
to accomplish prodigies; patient purpose, with the same faith that
inspired the Crusade, is conducting the Unions to victory--distant, but
sure. To-day twenty-three States are organized, with thousands of local
auxiliaries, and all confederated in a National Union.
It is safe to say that never did any form of philanthropic work afford
scope for so great diversity of talent and of method as this branch
of the temperance reform “of the women, by the women.” In the days of
the Crusade a dear old grandmother said: “I’m of no use except to go
along and cry,” and in the same spirit a negro servant said to the
lady for whom she worked: “I be’ant good for much, but I kin hold the
ole ombereller over you;” and even the family dog sometimes walked
with stately step beside his mistress as she lead her “Band.” So, in
these blessed days that have succeeded, and which have brought such
inspiration to our lives that “I’m glad I’m alive!” is a frequent
exclamation, there is a place that seems “just made on purpose” for
every honest heart and helpful hand. Some feel a special call to the
gospel work, and others to the execution of the law; some give their
time to organizing Unions, others to canvassing for subscribers to our
paper; some raise money, others raise the tone of public sentiment;
some work among the children, others labor for the men who drink and
sell, and all are warmly welcomed and find abundant “elbow-room.”
It was the great Iconoclast, that wonderful Crusade! It broke down
sectarian barriers; it taught women their power to transact business,
to mould public opinion by public utterance, to influence the decisions
of voters, and opened the eyes of scores and hundreds to the need of
the Republic for the suffrages of women, and made them willing to take
up for their homes and country’s sake the burdens of that citizenship
they would never have sought for their own.
But best of all, it revealed to the mothers and daughters in our Israel
their opportunity and duty to employ the growing leisure which our
advancing civilization and multiplied mechanical contrivances afford
them, in building up Christ’s empire on the earth. It is a very plain,
practical matter to help organize the kingdom of heaven in a human
breast. It is a business enterprise based on an eminently practical
treatise known as the New Testament. Replace the brandy flask in the
pocket of a drinking man by the Bible--get him to read with sincere
wish to understand the words that are spirit and life, and you have
set in motion the forces of a new dispensation in his heart. You have
built him up within instead of propping him from without. To give him
a loaf of bread, if hungry, would be a good thing, but to put him on
track of getting one for himself by feeding him with heavenly bread,
is better. To put a broken arm in a sling is a kind act, but if one
could by an electric touch make that arm whole, that were the supreme
benefaction, and analogous to that is the loving “gospel work” by which
we help to enthrone conscience and enshrine Christ in a man’s soul. The
process is plain and simple as the Rule of Three. The geometric formula
that “all the angles of a triangle equal two right angles” is not
more demonstrable upon the blackboard than this rule is demonstrable
in a life, namely: Prayer will cause a man to cease from sinning,
as sin will cause a man to cease from prayer. The whole problem of
“how to do it” was wrought out over and over again by the women of
the Crusade. They proved anew to the great church militant that its
solution involves, and ever must, the individualism of Christ’s own
way of working; that “the masses” are to be lifted up one by one, and
not otherwise. It is a question of contact. It is “elbow heathen” the
Crusaders reached, just because they found them at their elbows. They
acted on the principle that the man and woman in the next alley to us
are a part of our parish in the geographical nature of things. Some
people spend a lifetime chasing after “the masses,” and are in such hot
pursuit they cannot stop to capture the unit of the mass--and that’s
the nearest and the neediest man. The masses elude us; the next door
neighbor couldn’t if he would, and wouldn’t if he could. The masses
are a glittering generality; the man, poor, needy, wicked, sad, is a
most unglittering fact. It is the way an army is recruited--one by one;
it is the way commerce marches across a continent and captures it for
civilization--one by one; it is the way Christ’s church adds to its
members, and heaven to its souls--one by one. And first, best, and
most sacred of the lessons taught by the Crusade, was _this lesson of
individual work for Christ_, which must be learned by every disciple
before Christ comes as King in government, in society and individual
life.
Travelling through Ohio two years ago, and resting for a night in some
dear temperance woman’s home, how many times I said: “Now talk to me
of the Crusade,” and how significantly uniform was the reply: “O, that
was something only to be felt and lived; to be wept and prayed over--it
wasn’t to be told.”
But as you, dear sisters of Ohio, Indiana, and other States both
east and west, were helped to do a work so wonderful, even so, as I
believe, has our dear President of the National Union, which grew out
of the Crusade, been helped to be its faithful Chronicler. We, who
can but claim to be eleventh-hour laborers at best, may never see the
passion flower that burst into such splendid bloom before your eyes,
but evermore we shall be grateful to her whose patient hands gathered
up its scattered petals and preserved them for the herbarium of our
memory. Nay, not for ours alone. Posterity will listen to the story
and place its heroines in the Pantheon of undying fame. And yet how
well I know you have not wrought for this; nor is it a regret to you
that, as in this History our friend has written, so in later times the
record shall embalm your deeds, but not your names. One human life and
work signifies little to the world. But O, if we have tried to bless
the lives about us, whether in the sweet evangelism of our homes or in
the grand philanthropies by which society becomes the foster-parent
of thousands who are worse than motherless, we shall not have lived
in vain. Wherever in the nobler future of the land we love, there are
safe and happy homes, they will be safer and more happy because we have
lived and toiled. Wherever little children grow to maturity with less
to lure them into sin, and tempted manhood finds more helpful hands
outstretched to save, there we shall still be blessing, there we shall
still be blessed, though our names may be forgotten. O, “may we join
the choir invisible,” whose voices, sounding onward through the ages,
shall speak to sad humanity of Him who yesterday, to-day, forever,
abides the same!
“In the cross of Christ I glory,
Towering o’er the wreck of time;
All that’s bright in human story
Radiates from its form divine!”
FRANCES E. WILLARD.
CHICAGO,
[Illustration: MISS FRANCES E. WILLARD,
First Corresponding Secretary Woman’s National Christian Temperance
Union.
Elected President in 1879.]
HISTORY
OF THE
WOMEN’S TEMPERANCE CRUSADE.
CHAPTER I.
THE OUTLOOK AT THE BEGINNING OF THE CRUSADE.
We are a nation of God’s own right-hand planting. The Lord has given
us a goodly heritage--a land literally flowing with milk and honey. It
is estimated that our grain fields are broad and rich enough to supply
the people of all nations with bread. We have mineral wealth in rich
abundance; and cotton, and flax, and wool, and silks and furs with
which to clothe ourselves in royal apparel. Our scheme of government
is wise, and just, and humane--the best that was ever vouchsafed to
any people. And God has been with us in his providence in a marked and
wonderful manner; so that all our enemies have been subdued before
us by the breath of his power. At his word steam has lent her wings,
and the lightnings their voice, and heaven spread the wires of her
whispering gallery, like a network, over the continent, to help on the
cause of liberty and human progress.
Under these favorable circumstances, we might have been the strongest
and richest nation in the world had not our rulers in their unwisdom
encouraged the liquor traffic, and adopted a scheme of raising public
revenue in connection therewith which has been destructive to our
moral, industrial, and financial interests.
To avoid imposing a direct tax for the support of the government,
Congress in 1794 recognized and taxed the liquor traffic as a branch of
commerce. State legislatures soon followed the same unwise and suicidal
course. From that time on, protected and encouraged by the government,
which shared in its spoils, the traffic in intoxicating drinks
increased rapidly. In 1873, the beginning of the crusade, according
to the estimate of Dr. Young, Chief of the Bureau of Statistics, our
annual drink bill reached the enormous sum of $600,000,000! This was
an annual tax of over $15 per capita for every man, woman, and child
in the country. If the government had levied a direct tax to secure
the amount she realized from this business, the cost to the people
per capita would have been less than $1.80 instead of $15. And then
the government would have saved the immense sum expended annually in
sustaining a standing army of revenue officers, detectives, and gaugers
required in connection with the liquor business.
This enormous tax, which reached all grades of society, fell heaviest
on the laboring classes--upon those who could not afford to pay it;
and poverty and ruin came to millions. The whole land was filled
with beggary and crime, and a bitter wail of want and woe without
surcease went up to God. Millions who ought to have been producers and
bread-winners, became consumers, tramps and criminals. Men, mad with
strong drink, reeled through the streets; women, grown old before their
time, toiled in their comfortless homes in dumb despair, and little
half-starved children hid away in fear from their brutal fathers. It
was with us as it was with the Egyptians--there was one dead in almost
every house.
But the liquor-dealers were so intrenched behind law, so sheltered
in politics, so guarded and sustained by the government, that they
were an oligarchy that could dictate to statesmen, and control
legislatures, and defy public sentiment. Restrictive laws in most
of the states were weak and inoperative, and the demand for “free
rum” and a “free Sabbath” was fierce and loud, and many of the old
barriers against drunkenness and lewdness and crime were being broken
down. The government of our large cities was largely in the hands of
liquor-dealers or the creatures of their choice, and the police force
under their control; many of the courts were overawed or corrupted;
Justice was perverted, and Right and Truth trampled under foot. There
was no redress anywhere for those who had been wronged and ruined by
the liquor traffic; for the liquor oligarchy, which was largely made up
of foreigners, had the government by the throat, and compelled her “to
drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication.”
Spies were in the secret chambers of the government; men high in
places of trust guarded the liquor interests; enormous frauds were
planned and carried forward year after year; men who ought to have been
in the penitentiary were lobbying their schemes for plunder through
legislative bodies; the air of the national council chamber was reeking
with alcohol and tobacco. There seemed no hope for us or our country.
Congress was so much under the influence of the rum power that they
refused even to look into the matter when “a commission of inquiry” was
asked for by _hundreds of thousands of the best people in the land_,
lest they should give offence to the liquor oligarchy. Party managers
were careful to lay down their platforms so that liquor-dealers could
stand securely on every plank, no matter how many honest, worthy
citizens were crowded off.
_The nation was living on her own vitals._ For every thousand dollars
received from the liquor oligarchy, the government sacrificed one of
her own citizens. Sixty millions of dollars received--sixty thousand
men sacrificed annually on this putrid altar of sin.
This was asserted over and over again till the whole land rang with it,
but the government was too much under the control of liquor-dealers,
who counselled silence and secrecy, to investigate the charge.
Legislatures cowering before the liquor power spent their time making
laws for the protection of the beasts of the field, and the birds of
the air, and the fishes of the sea, while thousands of men and women
who were “of more value than many sparrows” were going down to death.
Men were fined for allowing Canada thistles to grow on their land,
but saloons were allowed to scatter the thistle-down of profanity,
lewdness, theft, robbery and murder broadcast. And any attempt to stop
the ruinous work was branded by liquor-dealers as a gross usurpation of
authority.
So the people were intimidated, and the drink curse fitted down into
every fold of society, and rested like a heavy, crushing weight on
every heart and home. The darkness was intense. None but the angels of
God, whose wings of light parted the clouds of gloom as they came down
on errands of mercy--none but the white-robed saints, who went with
weary feet bearing the lamp of truth into the habitations of cruelty,
into the saloons, and brothels and jails--knew, or guessed half of the
sin and sorrow curtained away behind the black folds of the liquor
traffic.
The slaves of appetite were not the only ones who writhed beneath the
iron heel of rum, and felt its hellish, fiery breath. The innocent
suffered with the guilty. This black, fathomless gulf of death swept
right alongside of Christian homes, and children trained in the lessons
of truth with loving care, consecrated at family altars and in the
church, were swept away from purity, home, mother and heaven, and
cursing God, went down, down with the mighty throng into the dark abyss
of a drunkard’s grave and a drunkard’s hell.
The church, in the presence of these evils she was commissioned to
overthrow, was criminally silent and inactive, and many of the watchmen
on the walls of Zion were dumb, and gave no warning voice when they saw
the approach of the enemy.
Temperance was not popular. Many who were abstainers said: “It is folly
to war against the drink system; men will sell as long as men will
drink, and no power can stop men from drinking.” Temperance societies
that had labored heroically for nearly a half century were holding
their own against fearful odds--fighting the battle single-handed.
The women were hopeless. Oh, the agony, the tears, the sleepless
nights, the heart-breaking anguish that wives and mothers suffered
during those long, bitter years of sorrow and silence, when few seemed
to care that the demon had come into their houses and was doing his
bloody work. When their hearts were breaking, if they cried out in
their agony or ventured a protest in the saloon or court, the liquor
oligarchy howled them down with the “mad dog cry” of “Strong-minded,”
“Unwomanly,” “Go home, old woman, and mend your husband’s breeches,”
“Go home and darn your stockings;” and the world joined in the
laugh of scorn, and the church made no defence of the wronged and
broken-hearted. And so the money that ought to have come to them to
buy new clothing, went into the tills of the liquor-dealers, and they
stayed at home till the home was gone, and mended garments till there
were no garments to mend. No pen can portray the utter hopelessness of
the women into whose homes the drink curse had come. The men who had
sworn at the altar to protect and honor them had become demons from
whom they fled in fear; the white-souled children they had nurtured
with tenderest care, and cradled with prayer and Christian song, had
become loathsome sots, too low and brutish for companionship. They
had been robbed of all--property, social position, brothers, husbands,
sons, love and hope.
Nor were their more fortunate sisters free from care. The gulf of ruin
was near each door, and an undefined dread, an awful foreboding, was in
the heart of every thoughtful wife and mother lest all she loved should
be swallowed up in its black depths.
Countless unspoken prayers went up to God. Women weeping and praying
through the long night-watches appealed their cause, lost in so many of
the courts of earth, to the _Supreme Court_ of Heaven.
Suddenly the world was startled by a flash of heavenly light. Hands of
faith had touched the hem of power, and a mighty spiritual swirl came
down upon the people. Christian women, many of whom had never spoken or
prayed in their own churches, under this Pentecostal baptism went into
the streets and saloons preaching the gospel of Christ, and the people
gathered by thousands to listen to the truths that fell from their lips.
The air seemed surcharged with spiritual forces. The angel of the Lord
that John the Revelator saw was before the altar, “and there was given
him much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all
saints upon the altar which was before the throne. And the smoke of the
incense which came with the prayers of all saints ascended up before
God out of the angel’s hand.
“And the angel took the censer and filled it with fire of the altar,
and cast it into the earth, and there were voices and thunderings and
lightnings and an earthquake.”
The whole nation was stirred. Never before had men so trembled under
the power of prayer, or stood in such awe of the fierce lightnings
of God’s wrath. Never before had society been so shaken by a moral
earthquake.
The women who kept step with God in his grand onward marching were
calm and serene. To them the thunder and lightning was but the roll
and rumble of God’s artillery turned against their enemies, and the
earthquake the tread of their Captain and his mighty hosts. Inspired
by a heaven-born heroism, they went into the saloons, and facing the
liquor-dealers in the midst of their deadly work, entreated them in
God’s name to give up their business and seek pardon and salvation in
Christ.
Delicately nurtured women, who had not felt the awful evil in their
own homes, and who had passed by on the other side and hardly ventured
to look toward the dens where their neighbors’ children were being
murdered by the slow tortures that kill soul and body, marched boldly
into the saloons and on into the back rooms where the awful secrets of
sin and debauchery are hid away, and preached to the spirits in prison
there. Men who walked among the tombs heard through them the voice of
the Master and were delivered.
Public attention was directed to the liquor traffic as never before. A
calcium light had been turned upon it, and the mass of the people were
horrified at what they saw and heard.
Liquor-dealers writhed under this close scrutiny--under this blaze
of light--like serpents in the fire, spitting forth their venom and
stinging themselves in their fury. But when Mrs. Thompson and the
seventy women who followed her went out of the Presbyterian Church at
Hillsboro’, Ohio, singing,
“Give to the winds your fears;
Hope and be undismayed:
God hears thy sighs and counts thy tears:
God will lift up thy head--”
they heralded a new dispensation in the temperance work--a
union of the moral forces of earth with the invincible forces of
heaven, and victory was assured.
The Crusade, then, was God’s method of arousing public sentiment and
consolidating the moral forces of the land, and women His chosen
instruments for this important and unusual work.
OHIO.
THE BEGINNING OF THE CRUSADE.