Democratic Sentinel, Volume 2, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 June 1878 — Fremont’s Ups and Downs. [ARTICLE]

Fremont’s Ups and Downs.

There are few of any political faith who will not approve of the appointment of Gen. John C. Fremont to the Territorial Governorship of Arizona. His life has been unexampled in its great possibilities and its conspicuous failures. From an obscure army officer, with ill-directed love of adventure, he burst upon the country as a Presidential candidate, and lost tbe race by a nominal and always-disputed majority in Philadelphia, in October, 1856, and from the first leader of the Republican party, he .has long been forgotten in politics and entirely uufelt in the affairs of state. Once regarded as one of the first millionaires of the continent, he is now broken in fortune and owns no- part of this world’s surface but a grave. When war came he was hurried home from Paris to accept one of the most important commands in the Union, and in a few months he was degraded by those who had been his friends and his military career stamped with failure. He conceived the construction of a grand trans-conti-nental railway on the Southern line, commanded the favor of Congress and the confidence of Paris bankers, only to De swamped in irretrievable bankruptcy, denounced as a swindler and convicted of fraud in the criminal courts of France. With all his prominence in the political movements of the country his only experience in civil trust was a few days’ service as one of the first United States Senators from California. He has been jeered by political enemies as the statesman who never made a speech; the General who never fought a battle, and the millionaire who never had a dollar; but, with all his failures, Gen. Fremont has deserved well of the nation, for he has generously sowed where others have reaped, and in all the wrongs imputed to him he has been greatly more sinned against than sinning. His accomplished wife (Jessie Benton) has bravely struggled with him in all the sad mutations of fortune through which they have passed, and the education of their son has been accomplished by the fruits of her pen. They will well grace tne humble gubernatorial mansion of Arizona, and President Hayes will be thanked for the appointment by the very many who have grateful memories of 1856. Philadelphia Times.