Perry County, Indiana - Chapter 22: Immediately Before the War Between the States, 1916

The history of Perry County in the earlier half of the 'sixties, like that of the nation at large, is practically the story of the War Between the States, besides which all other occurrences during 1861 to 1865 shrink to insignificance. And, for the sake of clear understanding, let it be recognized that the phrase employed to designate the conflict in question is the only one among all those in use - Civil War, War of Secession, Rebellion, etc., - which is at once of complete accuracy and absolute impartiality.

The late Charles Francis Adams, of Massachusetts, wrote : "The term Civil War signifies nothing. There have been innumerable civil wars, and as a matter of general history it is manifestly absurd for us to appropriate the term to a single civil war of our own." James Bryce, the English historian of international reputation, British Ambassador to Washington, 1912-1915, in his "American Commonwealths," speaks of the United States as: "A Union of Commonwealths * * * they have over their citizens an authority which is their own and not delegated by the central Government. They - that is, the older ones among them - existed before it. They could exist without it. Seven states seceded and confederated without resorting to arms, regarding secession as their court of last resort, and simply one among what they considered other equal rights under a Constitution whose interpretation, until then, had never been established on those points. Thus, the war was not - exclusively - 'of secession.' "

Presidents - were 'rebels,' inasmuch as they conducted armed resistance against a power of which they armitted themselves subjects up to the signing of a certain document, July 4, 1776. The Southrons construed their doctrine of State Sovereignty as justifying them in maintaining its claim by force, yet never placed themselves in 'rebellion' to any authority they had previously recognized.

In saying the War Between the States, the noun 'States' is used in a collective sense, exclusively, implying no war between individual commonwealths. The official titles of the two contending parties involved were the United States of America and the Confederate States of America, and the historical perspective gained through fifty years of national peace shows conclusively that

It could not be expected that merely moving across Mason and Dixon's Line would work any mysterious sea-change in the temperament of the Virginians, Marylanders or Carolinians who had transplanted their family stock to Hoosier soil, and Perry County contained many sturdy Old Line Whigs, conscientious believers in "States Rights." Nor had departure from their 'stern and rock-bound coast' modified the somewhat austere ideals of those New Englanders who had sought homes in the Middle West ; and among the residents of Eastern descent were Abolitionists of the most pronounced type. Cavalier and Puritan faced each other, as in centuries before, and it is to the everlasting credit of Perry County that local controversy was never more than a battle of opinions, couched in eloquence of greater or less degree.

issue involving the perpetuity of our national existence, Perry County forgot her petty quarrels, sending away her sons, shoulder to shoulder, - her own native-born lads, American through ancestry reaching to Colonial days, alongside her adopted children of other nationalities, French, Belgian, Irish, Scotch, English and German. In all, 3,558 men are credited by the Adjutant-General to Perry County; a total surpassed by no other county in Indiana in proportion to her population.

That the tide of popular opinion in the county had begun to turn toward the Union, and against its possible disintegration, is placed upon record beyond question by the tabulated vote in the presidential elections of 1856 and 1860. For Buchanan and Breckinridge, 1,066 votes were cast, opposed by 632 for Fillmore and Donelson, a Democratic plurality of 434. In 1860 the total vote was greater by 441 than that of four years previous, 244 of these ballots being in the twoyear-old Swiss colony of Tell City, for the first time a factor in county politics. The double split in the Democratic party, which placed three of their candidates in the field, had in that particular a parallel fiftytwo years later in the Republican party. Lincoln and Hamlin polled 1,026 votes ; Douglas and Johnson, 947 ; Bell and Everett, 160; Breckinridge and Lane, 6; a plurality of 79 for the Republican candidates.

The campaign was in every respect the most exciting one the county had experienced, owing to the extraordinary division of sentiment, even among members of the same families, brothers voting opposite tickets, wives adhering to principles directly contrary to the politics of their husbands. 'Pole-raisings' had furnished occasion for large public gatherings during the summer in all sections of the county, the flags being made at home by the women, and in some instances formally presented by some chosen fair one. Conspicuously located at Cannelton, within full view of passing steamboats, were three of these flaunting standards, only the Breckinridge party being too weak to display their emblem. The Bell pole was the tallest in Indiana, its height 215 feet, but the Lincoln flag was by far the largest, representing thousands of patient stitches from the women who wrought its stars and stripes with patriotic needles. Joshua B. Huckeby, an elector on the Bell and Everett Constitutional Union ticket, whose platform consisted of the vague sentence : "The constitution of the country, the union of the states, the enforcement of the laws," was subjected to much neighbourly chaffing, because his wife refused her assistance toward making his party flag, but worked ardently upon the Lincoln banner, their two sons voting with the Republicans.

The only English newspaper in the county was the Cannelton Reporter, (the Tell City Helvetia being printed in the German language,) and its columns during 1860 show the strong Democratic sentiment existing, although none of its utterances could be classed as disloyal from a Northern standpoint, Jacob B. Maynard, its editor, continually expressing his belief in some sort of satisfactory adjustment between the two sections of the country, while always warmly favourable toward Southern principles.

The election of Lincoln by a strictly sectional majority in November, followed within six weeks by South Carolina's ordinance of secession, brought about a situation too highly charged with intense partisanship to permit a disregard of conditions, and on December 27, 1860, the Reporter printed a call for a public meeting of citizens on the opening day of the New Year, at Cannelton, its designated object, - "in view of the present distracted condition of the country * * * the purpose of giving expression of our unwavering devotion to the Union in its most forcible form." Every township and each political party found representation among the signatures which numbered fiftysix, just the same as of those immortal "Signers" who appended their names to the Declaration of Independence.

Pursuant to this call, at one o'clock, Tuesday afternoon, January 1, 1861, an assemblage was gathered which tested the capacity of Mozart Hall, the largest meeting place in Cannelton. Hamilton Smith was made chairman, and Charles H. Mason and Jacob B. Maynard the secretaries. Upon motion of John James Key it was carried that the chair appoint a committee of seven to draft resolutions upon public affairs, which should be submitted to the meeting for action thereon. Job Hatfield, chairman; Ballard Smith, William Mc- Kinley, Sr., Dr. James Foster, Andrew P. Batson, Allen Hyde and Dr. L Hargis formed the committee, during whose absence for deliberation speeches were delivered by Joshua B. Huckeby, Charles H. Mason, Jacob B. Maynard and Hamilton Smith. Each address was a stirring appeal to loyalty, frequently broken by tumultuous applause, yet all exhibited some doubt as to the best course to be pursued in the emergency of the further secession of Southern states.

On their return, the committee presented a series of six resolutions, the first four merely pledging the attachment of the county to the Federal Union ; consenting to any honourable concessions to preserve the Union; recommending the repeal of personal liberty bills ; and deprecating that peaceably disposed citizens of Perry County had been subjected to hostile treatment in the South. These were received with demonstrations of general satisfaction, but the reading of Resolutions Five and Six made it instantly evident that the parting of the ways had come. The series ended with the two following clauses :

"Resolved, That if by reason of the existing unhappy difficulties the Union should be sundered, which may God forbid, we hereby pledge ourselves to the people of the border states, both slave and free, to co-operate with them in any measure that will secure to us the Federal Union, and to all our citizens the rights, privileges, liberties and immunities which we have under our present noble Constitution, believing that if the

"Resolved, That if no concessions and compromises can be obtained and a disunion shall be unfortunatelymade between the Northern and Southern States, then the commercial, manufacturing and agricultural interests of the people of this county require us to say that we can not consent that the Ohio River shall be the boundary line of the contending nations, and we earnestly desire that if a line is to be drawn between the North and the South that line shall be found north of us."

William McKinley, Sr., of the committee, recorded himself in opposition to these two sections, but the adoption of the series as a unit was moved by George W. Patterson and the motion received several seconds. Charles H. Mason, however, proposed an amendment, carried after some discussion, by which each resolution should be voted upon separately. As a result, the first five were unanimously adopted, but the final clause elicited fiery discussion from both sides. Joshua B. Huckeby, Charles H. Mason, Dr. Harmon S. Clark, Thomas W. Taylor and Henry P. Brazee, Jr., opposed its adoption, Ballard Smith, Job Hatfield, Jacob B. Maynard and Doctor Hargis debating in its favour. After extended and heated argument, the cries of "Question! Question!" at length procured a vote, the result announced by the chair being: For the resolution, 99 ; against the resolution, 55 ; many present not voting. Thunders of applause greeted the verdict, which was followed by immediate adjournment.

In its next issue (January 3), which detailed the foregoing, the Reporter said editorially: "We have been told that the Southern feeling would expend itself in bluster and brag; that it meant nothing - all would subside. We have never believed it; we have warned our readers against this delusion. Terrible times are upon us - fearful times; a mighty nation is going to pieces, and if we would not be involved in calamities beggaring description, let us take manly ground and place Indiana in a position where the wild waves of fanaticism can not engulf us. * * * The Ohio River must never be the boundary line between contending nations. We have always lived upon terms of friendship with our Kentucky neighbours; Kentucky by no act of hers has ever shown any spirit but that of the right ; Indiana has never passed a personal liberty bill ; Perry County has ever been true to the letter and spirit of the Constitution, and if the time should ever come to trace on the map of our country the boundaries of new Republics, the Ohio River can not be one of those boundaries - never ! The line must go north of us and the further north the better."

The proclamation of President Buchanan setting apart Friday, January 4, as a day of fasting and prayer for deliverance from national calamity, was not generally regarded at Cannelton in the proper spirit of its intention, but to the credit of many God-fearing citizens be it told that solemn services of intercession were held by the clergymen of the Episcopal and Roman Catholic congregations, the Rev. William Louis Githens in St. Luke's Church, and the Rev. Michael Marendt in St. Michael's Church, both pastors heading their flocks in dutiful observance of the doctrinal precept, "to pay respectful obedience to the Civil Authority regularly and legitimately constituted ;" the same consistent conservatism which enabled their national systems to maintain unbroken organic union through the years of strife which disrupted practically every other religious body in America.

There is little question that the prevailing sentiment in the county at this time was pro-Southern, not unnatural through commercial interests and intimate personal relations with the South, it being generally felt that in the contingency of the Union's dissolution the line of demarcation must go north instead of south of

On the forty-sixth anniversary of Jackson's victory at New Orleans, styled in the Cannelton Reporter "the Glorious Eighth of January," 1861, in Polk's Bottom, (now Tobinsport) a joint assembly of citizens from Perry County and Breckinridge County, Kentucky, was held as a Union Meeting. For chairman the choice fell upon Colonel David Rodman Murray, Cloverport's foremost citizen, a strikingly handsome man, of conspicuous personal loyalty to the Federal Government. He had been thrice married; first to a Miss Alexander, secondly to Eliza Huston, and thirdly to 'the Widow Crittenden,' (Anna Maria Allen) daughter of the gallant Captain John Allen, who fell at the Battle of the Raisin River. James H. Gibbon, of Perry County, was secretary, and upon motion by Daniel L. Armstrong, a committee of six, equally divided, was appointed to frame the sense of the meeting; Jacob B. Maynard, George W. Patterson and Hiram Carr, of Indiana; William Vest, Daniel Hambleton and Dr. J. F. Christian, of Kentucky.

The preamble and resolutions presented and unanimously adopted, were practically identical with the Cannelton document of a week previous, save for the insertion of Breckinridge County's name alongside that of Perry, and in the closing sentence of the final clause, which expressed the wish that a dividing line - if forced upon the two counties - should be found "North or South of us," a pledge to the sister interests of both.

The entire assembly were lavishly entertained as guests of the neighbourhood farmers, one of the earliest recorded instances of that splendid hospitality which the same families maintain as a standard in their homes today. Hundreds partook of their bounteous cheer, hundreds more could have been filled, with plenty still on hand. The boundless profusion of good things prepared by the whole-souled people of Polk's Bottom was likened by the editor of the Reporter (not always

Nor was Breckinridge County lacking in generosity. After adjournment the citizens of Cloverport invited all the Indianians present to cross the river and partake of Kentucky hospitality, which was spread before them with unstinted hand. Colonel Murray presided as informal toast-master, while mutual healths were pledged, and the day - like the historic eve of Waterloo - was closed with a "Grand Union Ball." No Hoosier or Corncracker bard has immortalized this in verse, as Byron did the Duchess of Richmond's function at Brussels, though with the beauty and chivalry of Indiana and Kentucky gathered