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In enumerating the
professions or avocations not represented in our lumbering
communities along Green Bay before the middle of the last century -
and which we were able to do without - I might have added
politicians. There was none of the machinery of elections, no
voting, no local offices to be filled, no contests to be decided,
and consequently no fervent campaigning or discussion of popular
rights. In the absence of township or city organization the
superintendent or "boss" was supreme, although his position brought
him nothing but responsibilities, a condition which suited our
purposes much better, I have no doubt, than an elaborate system of
local government. With reference to the larger questions of national
polity we were in a situation of splendid isolation. The only
matters that occupied our attention were those of our immediate
environment, and they had to do exclusively with lumber.
My own interests,
however, extended beyond this restricted field; and I was one of the
few, I dare say, who reached out to the broader horizon of politics.
This could be accomplished through the medium of the Congressional
Globe, for which I subscribed in the fifties, which served the
purpose of the Congressional Record and published a detailed account
of the activities of the national legislature. It was printed by
Judge Blair, one of whose sons, Francis, a general in the Civil War,
subsequently became a candidate for Vice-President with Seymour, and
another, Montgomery, was Lincoln's Postmaster-General. In the
logging camps in the forest at times and at the mills I was able
through the columns of the Globe to follow the progress of
legislative events; and not a few times, with the information so
obtained, discomfited in the course of political argument men from
Milwaukee, Chicago, and other cities who assumed that a knowledge of
national affairs had not percolated to the out-of-the-way places in
the northern forests.
One incident in this
connection stands out with peculiar distinctness. Horatio Seymour,
who was elected governor of New York in 1862, came to Escanaba in
the spring of 1861 and loitered there for a week or more, remaining
incognito for political reasons. On his way south he stopped at
Marinette, where he was to board the "Queen City" for Green Bay. For
six hours we discussed political matters in my office at the mill.
He held to the pacific view that the cotton states should be
permitted to secede if they wished to do so and that they would
return to the Union of their own volition. This I met with the
argument that the same rule could be applied to counties wishing to
withdraw from states and townships wishing to withdraw from
counties, a course that would obviously lead to chaos. None the less
the time passed pleasantly and when the boat had taken on her cargo
Seymour embarked. At Green Bay, it appeared, he was to have met
Judge Lord of St. Louis and a prominent politician from the South
who inadvertently disclosed the purpose of his visit while playing a
game of cards. Seymour went on to Milwaukee, where his presence was
discovered, and made a short and noncommittal speech on the question
of secession. On this, as on other occasions, my familiarity with
debates in Congress enabled me to discuss intelligently the various
aspects of public problems.
My earliest
introduction to politics came when I was a youth in Bangor. Before
that I had seen as a small boy something of the excitement which
attended the campaigns and elections in New Brunswick,—very often
marked by hostilities between the Orangemen and the Catholics,— when
my elders were importuned to cast their "plumpers," whole votes as
distinguished from fractional votes, for one or the other of the
rival candidates. But it was in Maine that the responsibilities of
citizenship were first held up to me. While driving across the
bridge with the sister of Mrs. March, whose husband was a partner of
Mr. Sinclair, we saw in the public square a floating banner
inscribed with the names of Polk and Dallas, presidential and
vice-presidential candidates on the Democratic ticket. "Isaac," said
my companion, who had acted to some extent as my teacher also, "if I
had anything to do with politics, I would be a Whig. I certainly
wouldn't be one of those old "loco-focos."
Whether or not I
acted upon her advice, I followed that course. The men with whom I
had been associated were Whigs, the sailors on the lakes, as I have
said, were Whigs, and it was but natural in this environment that I
should become a Whig also. Before I attained voting age, however,
the party became defunct and was succeeded by the Republican party,
to which I have given my support from the time of its organization
down to the present day. The only part I played in the affairs of
the Whig party was that of an ardently interested onlooker (luring
the election of President Taylor in 1848, when I was nineteen years
old.
One of my earliest
recollections of a political event in the Middle West is of a
gathering in the courthouse square in Milwaukee in 1847, when
Governor Dodge, of the Territory of Wisconsin, delivered an address.
Shaking with malaria,—"ague-and-chill " fever, as it was more
commonly called,— I sat on the ground with my back against an oak
tree on the outskirts of the crowd, a melancholy figure, while the
governor conveyed his message, whatever it might have been, to the
populace. If he had any political principles to expound, they were
lost on me.
The first service I
rendered the Republican party was to "peddle" tickets for Fremont
and Dayton, at the City hall in Chicago, on November 3, 1856. At
this time I was associated with Holt and Mason, for whom I logged by
contract at Masonville, and happened to come to Chicago on a
business trip with Mr. Holt at the time of the national election. He
was an ardent Republican and induced me, although I was unable to
vote, to render such service as I could by distributing ballots. The
day was cold, and the sleet and snow whipped by a gale from the lake
had turned the streets of Chicago into a dismal area of mud. But I
stuck to my post all day, hailing voters and urging the claims of
Fremont.
In Marinette, which
was then included in the territory of Oconto County, by reason of my
position in the industrial life of the community, I was singled out
for political responsibilities almost as soon as the town emerged
from the camp stage of its development. In 1859, the year after the
mill of the N. Ludington Company came under my charge, I was elected
supervisor of the town, an office which I held for fifteen years.
For fourteen years, also, as justice of the peace, I did more than
my share to settle petty disturbances, patch up disagreements,
officiate at weddings, and otherwise otherwise keep the life of the
community running smoothly.
In the latter
capacity, however, I tried but few cases and accomplished much more
as a peacemaker than as a magistrate. In most instances the
litigants could be persuaded to settle their differences amicably.
In two cases I awarded damages of twenty-five dollars, which were
increased to fifty dollars when appeal was taken to the Circuit
Court by the disgruntled party.
Serious cases,
fortunately, we did not have, but some of them were what might be
described as stubborn. One in particular arose over a half-barrel of
pickles worth about four dollars. Two residents of Marinette who had
been good friends for years became glowering enemies, engaged
attorneys, to whom they paid ten dollars each, and settled down
defiantly to fight to the last ditch until they had secured justice
- or vengeance, all to determine merely who owned and who did not
own the pickles. When the case was brought before me I continued it
for a week, hoping that time would subdue the enmity, but when it
had elapsed there was no cooling of belligerent spirits. They
appeared in court with their counsel prepared to argue the case.
Thereupon I laid my
magisterial dignity, or whatever I had of it, aside and led the two
principals into a corner. "The pickles," I said, "cost four dollars.
You have each paid a lawyer ten dollars, lost three or four days of
time, and spoiled your peace of mind. When it is all over neither of
you will have any satisfaction and both of you will have more
expenses. Why go to all this trouble?"
The. two litigants
began to see the situation in a different light. Their defiance
melted, they shook hands and dismissed the lawyers, and became the
good friends they were before. Technically speaking this might not
have been administering justice, but it was the course I chose to
follow.
As justice of the
peace it also became my duty to officiate at more than a score of
weddings, most of which were of my own making. Many of the young men
who could wield axes in the forest masterfully, drive logs in the
turbulent river, and saw lumber were more or less inarticulate when
it came to wooing and needed impetus of one kind or another to
encourage them to take the plunge. I adopted the method of
suggesting adroitly to the man and woman that the one was very much
interested in the other and kept the interest of the young people
alive, if necessary, by constant reiteration. Sooner or later this
inspired confidence, the shyness was overcome, and the match was
made.
Not all of these
weddings, however, were of an idyllic sort. One day I was summoned
to the house of a trapper who, following a rather primitive practice
not unusual at the time, had for twenty years lived with an Indian
woman of the Menominee tribe. During all these years they had not
regarded a marriage ceremony as a necessity, but the advantage of it
was brought home to them when the government required a marriage
certificate as a condition precedent for the payment of five dollars
a month to the wives of men who had enlisted. The trapper was
drafted and to insure the payment of the money to his squaw they
sent for me to perform the civil ceremony.
The woman in her
feminine way looked forward to the event with elation. She appeared
smiling radiantly, with her face shining, almost dripping with
sturgeon oil, the Indian idea of cosmetics, and decked out in the
glaring finery that stirred her aboriginal sense of beauty. The
groom was less radiant, regarding the affair as an unavoidable
bother. I did my best to enter into the spirit of the occasion from
the woman's point of view, made the ceremony as impressive as
possible, joined their hands with great gravity, and pronounced them
man and wife.
"Now," said the groom
when I had finished, glowering at the smiling bride, "I hope to
heaven you're satisfied!"
During the campaign
of 1860, when Lincoln was a candidate for the first time, I was
again in Chicago and did not vote, but took an active part in the
canvass in Wisconsin. These were days of stress and storm and the
shadow of war already seemed to be upon us. If we had escaped the
turmoil of politics up to this time it was only to have it thrust
upon us in more than full measure with the discussion over the slave
question and other problems that threatened the disruption of the
nation. The Republicans were, of course, for Lincoln and there were
a number of Douglas Democrats who were opposed to secession and were
not altogether sympathetic with the Southern point of view. But
there was also among the laboring men a large element of
"copperheads," constituting more than half the Democratic voters,
who were bitter in their antagonism toward the administration and
rejoiced whenever a Confederate victory was proclaimed. They
cultivated very zealously the foolish fear that if the slaves were
liberated they would overrun the North and demoralize the labor
market.
When the gathering
storm broke, shortly after President Lincoln's election, the task of
making preparation for it overshadowed all other activity, and much
of my time was given up to filling our quota of troops. On March 4,
1862, Colonel Balcolm, of Oconto, went to Washington and offered the
President a regiment of soldiers of which, according to the plans we
had made, he was to be colonel and I lieutenant-colonel. The
organization was to be one of lumbermen, who, after a winter in the
woods, were in the best possible physical condition to undergo the
vicissitudes of a military campaign except for the lack of training.
It would be, we contemplated, one of the "crack" regiments of the
army. The plans, however, were never carried out nor our ambitions
achieved. The government declined the offer on the ground that it
had all the men it wanted at the time and was without guns to equip
more.
In September, 1862, a
draft was ordered and my name appeared in the list. I was anxious to
go to the front, but the other members of the N. Ludington Company
contended that I would be of far greater service to the country by
remaining where I was, as there was no one else available to take
charge of the mill and keep the business upon which a large part of
the community depended for a living, going. I therefore went to
Green Bay and secured my release by purchase, paying at the same
time for the release of several of the men whose services at the
mill could not be dispensed with.
In the meantime I did
what I could to encourage enlistment. In 1863, when a ninety-day
company was organized, I induced thirteen men to join by paying
them, in addition to the thirteen dollars a month they received from
the government, another thirteen dollars; so that their pay while in
service would amount to twenty-six dollars. Later I induced ten or
twelve other men to enroll by offering a. similar bonus. I also took
the initiative in having the county board adopt a resolution to pay
one hundred and twenty dollars to every man that enlisted and was
credited to Oconto County. In other ways, too, there was aid to be
extended. A carpenter, by way of illustration, said he would go to
the front if he could dispose of his tools; and I paid him fifty
dollars for them, though they were scarcely worth ten.
The last call for
recruits came while I was on my way to Washington to attend the
inauguration of Lincoln the second time. Word was sent to me at
Green Bay and I immediately made arrangements for supplying fourteen
men, contributing $2,200 to that end, and telegraphed to the New
York Company suggesting that they subscribe a similar amount. These
men did not proceed farther than Madison when peace was declared,
and a part of the money we had contributed was repaid in town and
county orders reduced in value to thirty cents on the dollar.
Although very sparsely populated, Oconto County supplied two
companies during the war. Brown County, in which Green Bay is
situated, contributed more officers than men during the first two
years -a, comparison not unfavorable to us.
The news of Lincoln's
assassination on April 14, 1865, was brought to its by a boat, the
captain of which sent me a note as soon as he had dropped anchor at
time mouth of the harbor. It was Sunday morning. My buggy, was at
the door and I was about to drive to church with my wife when a man
rode up with the brief message that the President had been shot by
John Wilkes Booth at Ford's Theater in Washington.
Even under the shadow
of this national catastrophe the hostility of the misguided
"copperheads" was not altogether suppressed. As I turned to read the
captain's note to a group of persons that had gathered about me, one
of them, an employee at the mill, clapped his hands in manifestation
of his approval of the murder and turning to the others said: "Let's
go over to Jack's saloon and get a drink." For the moment I could
scarcely control my indignation, and I told him in no uncertain
terms that the earth would be well rid of him and his kind. By way
of retribution, perhaps, for the offensive remark, the arm of the
man who made it was blown off by an exploding cannon on July 4 of
the same year, an accident over which, I must confess, I felt little
regret. The doleful message announcing the assassination of Lincoln
was sent down to the minister, who read it to the congregation; and
even in this far distant village, despite the exultation of the
"copperheads," the gloom of mourning fell. I hope I may never see
the turmoil and the bitterness of those days again.
There was one other
occasion during this period when the villages along Green Bay and
throughout Wisconsin generally were stirred to the pitch of military
excitement and made elaborate preparations for defense. This was in
1862. An Indian massacre at New Ulm, Minnesota, had awakened the
fear of a general uprising of the savages which spread like a
prairie fire, increasing in intensity as it progressed. Soon the
obsession assumed the proportions of a panic. Everywhere throughout
the state people on isolated farms or in forest camps congregated
around the nearest villages for protection. Even in the vicinity of
Milwaukee men, women, and children hastened to the city and for
several days the streets were congested with refugees encamped
there.
The danger was
remote. It was preposterous to assume that a band of Indians, even
though considerable in numbers, could traverse a wilderness of
several hundred miles and raid cities and towns. Nevertheless, the
fear was genuine though groundless. In Marinette the Indians and
half-breeds were as panic-stricken as the white people, and to meet
the situation and prevent the workmen at the mills from deserting
their posts we perfected a military organization and commissioned
Dr. Hall and one or two others to go to Madison to obtain a hundred
Belgian rifles, a part of the stock Fremont had purchased in Europe
at the outbreak of the war. These weapons were all but useless, but
they served our purpose as they restored the confidence of the
people in their ability to defend themselves. The company elected me
captain and, with the aid of Hardy's tactics, which I studied
assiduously, I drilled the men for more than a month. At the end of
that time the panic had abated and normal conditions were restored. |
