Rensselaer Republican, Volume 19, Number 27, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 March 1887 — REMINISCENCES OF PUBLIC MEN. [ARTICLE]

REMINISCENCES OF PUBLIC MEN.

BY BEN: PERLEY POORE.

Ellen Swan, the beautiful d»Tighter of one of the most aristocratic families of Baltimore, married Philip Barton Key. son of the author of the “.StarSpangled Banner.” One evening at a dinner party, given in honor of Col. William H. Watson, who was about to j leave for the Mexican war at the head I of the First Maryland Regiment, Bar- | ton Key seemed out of spirits, and 110 who wa>* usually the life of all social I gatherings scarcely opened his lips. ' Col. Watson noticed tlie unusual silence and--when - he was asked for a toast, J arose and proposed the health of j “Dumb Barton’s Bonnie Belle!” This | lady died in the prime of her youth and beauty., and Philip’Barton Key ’s tragical death at the hands of Daniel E. Sickles gave rise to one of tho most celebrated trials that has ever taken place in Washington. Among other army stories illustrative of tho*timiditv of soldiers at the opening of a battle, was that of the poor little private whom his Captain found keeping up bravely to his tile-leader, while the bullets of the skirmish line, which preceded, a hot engagement, were cutting the air about his ears. Those who., havo been in this peculiar situation need not be told that it gives nervous feelings to most men; and our Captain was not surprised but rather irritated, to And this soldier lad crying bitterly, although clutching his musket nnd never lagging a step. “Now, sir, what’s the matter?” demanded the irate officer. “Are you afraid?” “No-o; I ain’t a bit afraid,” replied the poor little fellow, in a broken voice;' “but I wish I was in my father’s barn.” “What would you do in your father’s barn?” “I’d go into the house!" Mr. Wintlirop, during his brief term of service in tlie. Senate as the successor of Daniel Webster, presented an interesting petition from the widow of Capt, Robert Gray, the discoverer of the Columbia River, asking relief. Capt. Gray was in the naval service of liis country during the war of the revolution, and afterwards, in the sloop Washington, was the first to carry the flag of our Union around the world. In a subsequent voyage,in the year 1792, he discovered and entered the Columbia River,to which he gave tho name of the ship which , lie commanded, aud thus founded the corner-stone of the American title. Mrs. Gray’s petition was accompanied by the original sea passport, signed by George Washington and attested, under which the Columbia sailed from Boston in 1790. A similar document bore the signature of John Hancock as Governor of Massachusetts, and a clearance certificate from the Boston custom house was signed by Benjamin Lincoln, collector of the port, whose name was honorably identified with several of the great battlefields of the Revolution. Capt. Gray bad died in ISOfi, leaving a widow and four children, with very little property, and she now asked Congress to cheer her old age by making such a grant to her and her daughters as would testify its appreciation of \a citizen whose nautical skill and bold enterprise had rendered so distinguished a benefit to his country. _ .... Senator Butler was a prominent figure in the Senate just before the war. He was a trifle larger around at the waistband than anywhere else, his white hair stood out as if he was charged with electric fluid, and South Carolina was legibly written on his rubicund countenance. The genial old gentleman would occasionally take a glass of wine too much in “the Hole in the Wall,” and then bully Hale or Chase a little, but he was a general favorite nevertheless, and when Mr. Sumner showed Mrs. Seward the manuscript of his speech on the “Barbarism of Slavery,” she advised him to strike out his allusion to Senator Butder; which provoked theeowardly attack of Preston S; Brooks.

The sudden formation of the “Knownothing, ” or, American party, was a political phenomenon. Men of all political creeds fraternized, under the stars and stripes, and adopted as their creed: “Our country, our whole country, and nothing but our' country. ” Mysterious movements all over the country attracted the curiosity of the people. An eager desire to learn w hat these movements meant operated on the public mind. The paraphernalia of and signs, and passwords, and degrees, and lodges, tickled the popular fancy. Above all, the necessity felt for some central point around which, as a nucleus, all the scattered elements of the opposition to the administration could crystalize into ’ shape or form, lent a sudden growth to the new organization. It became formidable, but it fell a prey to two classes. One was the anti-Boman Catholics, who sought to convert the movement into religious crusade against what they called “Popery,” although several prominent founders of the organization were Konmn Catholics. Brit the? American party was shipwrecked by Henry WilSon and other Abolitionists, who joined for the avowed purpose of breaking up the old Whig party, and preventing the new organization from becoming national by taking strong antislavery ground. Some of the very men who denounced the American movement are now prominent in their opposition?to the immigration of hordes of ignorant Chinese and Europeans. In 1882, a Representative from a New England district received a request from one of those nuisance constituents who are always writing for books, that he would send a copy of the collection bf patents on electricity, gotten up at the patent office. As the representative felt that he should want every vote the next fall that -he could get, he stepped into the patent office and asked if he could get a copy of the collection. He was told that he could, but only by paying the cost price, a few extra copies having been prepared. Supposing that it would be half or three-quarters of a dollar, the Kepresentative pulled out a one-dollar bill, and asked what the price was. To his horror the reply was $454.79. He did not buy the collection. This collection was made by order of the Commissioner of Patents to send to the International Eleetrieal Congress. There were 3,825 patents appertaining to or hearing upon electricity granted prior

to July 1, 1881, all reprinted in uniform style and the drawings reproduced by photo-lithographv. They were arranged in sixty-nine sub-classes and bound in sixteen quarto volumes of about 2,000 -pages each. A few additional copies were printed and bound for Sale, but 1 Congressmen oould not bo expected to give away many Of them.