# The Story of the Battle Hymn of the Republic/Chapter 2

THESE assaults by the serpent of slavery on the free institutions of the North and East were dangerous enough, yet, like other evils, they brought their own remedies with them. Such an open attack on free speech as that on Sumner was sure to be resented, while the forcible carrying-off of fugitive slaves under the shadow of old Faneuil Hall aroused a degree of wrath that even the pro-slavery leaders saw was ominous.
"The crime against Kansas" was still more alarming because it threatened to turn a free Territory into a slave State. In 1854 the Kansas and Nebraska bill had been passed, repealing the ​Missouri Compromise and exposing a vast area of virgin soil to the encroachments of the "peculiar institution."
The Free-soil men were speedily on the alert. During that same year of 1854 two Massachusetts colonies were sent out to Kansas, others going later.
But the leaders of the slave power had no intention of allowing men from the free States to settle peacefully in Kansas. They had repealed the Missouri Compromise with the express purpose of gaining a new slave State, and this was to be accomplished by whatever means were necessary.
It was an easy matter to send men from Missouri into the adjacent Territory of Kansas—to vote there and then to return to their homes across the Mississippi.
The New York Herald of April 20, 1855, published the following letter from a correspondent in Brunswick, Missouri:
From five to seven thousand men started from Missouri to attend the election, some to remove, but the most to return to their families, with an intention, if they liked the Territory, to make it their permanent abode at the earliest moment practicable. But they intended to vote. . . . Indeed, every county furnished its quota; and when they set out it ​looked like an army. . . . They were armed. . . . Fifteen hundred wore on their hats bunches of hemp. They were resolved if a tyrant attempted to trample upon the rights of the sovereign people to hang him.
It will be noted that "the rights of the sovereign people" were to go to the ballot-box not in their own, but in another State. These "border ruffians" took possession of the polls and carried the first election with pistol and bowie-knife.
The pro-slavery leaders strove to drive out the colonists from the free States and to prevent additional emigrants from entering the Territory. A campaign of frightfulness was inaugurated—with the usual result.
Governor Geary of Kansas, although a pro-slavery official himself, wrote (Dec. 22, 1856) that he heartily despised the abolitionists, but that "The persecutions of the Free State men here were not exceeded by those of the early Christians."
My father was deeply interested in the colonization of Kansas and in the struggle for freedom within its borders. He helped in 1854 to organize the "New England Emigrant Aid Company" which assisted parties of settlers to go to the Territory. In 1856 matters began to look very dark for the colonists from the free States. "Dr. ​Howe was stirred to his highest activity by the news from Kansas and by the brutal assault on Charles Sumner" (F. B. Sanborn). With others he called and organized the Faneuil Hall meeting. He was made chairman of its committee, and at once sent two thousand dollars to St. Louis for use in Kansas. This prompt action had an important effect on the discouraged settlers. Soon afterward he started for Kansas to give further aid to the colonists.
"I have traversed the whole length of the State of Iowa on horseback or in a cart, sleeping in said cart or in worse lodgings, among dirty men on the floor of dirty huts. We have organized a pretty good line of communication between our base and the corps of emigrants who have now advanced into the Territory of Nebraska. Everything depends upon the success of the attempt to break through the cordon infernale which Missouri has drawn across the northern frontier of Kansas."
In another letter he writes:
The boats on the river are beset by spies and ruffians, are hauled up at various places and thoroughly searched for anti-slavery men.
Camp of the Emigration, Nebraska Territory,
July 29, '56.
The emigration is indeed a noble one; sturdy, industrious, temperate, resolute men. . . . I wish our friends in the East could know the character and behavior of these emigrants. They are and have been for two weeks encamped out upon these vast prairies in their tents and waggons waiting patiently for the signal to move, exhausting all peaceful resources and negotiations before resorting to force.
There is no liquor in the whole camp; no smoking, no swearing, no irregularity. They drink cold water, live mostly on mush and rice and the simplest, cheapest fare. They have instruction for the little children; they have Sunday-schools, prayer-meetings, and are altogether a most sober and earnest community. Most of the loafers have dropped off. The Wisconsin company, about one hundred, give a tone to all the others. I could give you a picture of the drunken, rollicking ruffians who oppose this emigration—but you know it. Will the North allow such an emigration to be shut out of the National Territory by such brigands?
In another letter he tells us that among the emigrants were thirty-eight women and children—grandfathers and grandmothers, too, journeying with their live stock in carts drawn by oxen to the promised land. ​He says nothing of danger to himself, but Hon. Andrew D. White tells us that "Dr. Howe had braved death again and again while aiding the Free State men against the pro-slavery myrmidons of Kansas."
The strength of the movement may be judged from the fact that during this year (1856) the people of Massachusetts sent one hundred thousand dollars in money, clothing, and arms to help the Free State colonists. This money did not come from the radicals only, but from "Hunkers," as they were then called—i. e., conservative and well-to-do citizens. My father wrote: "People pay readily here for Sharp's rifles. One lady offered me one hundred dollars the other day, and to-day a clergyman offered me one hundred dollars."
My mother was greatly moved by these tragic events—the assault on Sumner and the civil war in Kansas. In Words for the Hour—a volume of her poems published in 1857—we find a record of her just indignation. In the "Sermon of Spring" she describes Kansas as:
This poem, which is a long one, contains a tribute to Sumner, as do also "Tremont Temple," "The Senator's Return," and "An Hour in the Senate." I give a brief extract from the last named:
How did the children of the household feel during this period of "Sturm und Drang"? To the older ones, at least, it was a most exciting time. While we did not by any means know of all that was going on, we felt very strongly the electric current of indignation that thrilled through our home, as well as the stir of action. My father early taught us to love freedom and to hate slavery. He gave us, in brief, clear outline, the story of the aggressions of the slave power. We knew of the iniquity of the Dred Scott decision before we were in our teens. Child that I was, I was greatly moved when he repeated Lowell's well-known lines:
My father had always something of the soldier about him—a quick, active step, gallant bearing, and a voice tender, yet strong, "A voice to lead a regiment." This was the natural consequence of his early experiences in the Greek War of Inde​pendence, when he served some seven years as surgeon, soldier, and—most important of all—almoner of America's bounty to the peaceful population. The latter would have perished of starvation save for the supplies sent out in response to Dr. Howe's appeals to his countrymen. The greater part of his life was devoted to the healing arts of the good physician. Yet the portraits of him, taken during the tremendous struggle of the anti-slavery period, show a sternness not visible in his younger nor yet in his later days.
In her poem "A Rough Sketch" my mother described him as he seemed to her at this time:
Charles Sumner came often to Green Peace when he was in Boston. We children greatly admired him. He seemed to us, and doubtless to others, a species of superman. I can hardly think of those days without the organ accompaniment of his voice—deeper than the depths, round and full. When our friend was stricken down in the Senate, great was our youthful indignation. Many were ​the arguments held with our mates at school and dancing-school, often the children of the "Hunker" class. They sought to justify the attack, and we replied with the testimony of an eye-witness to the scene (Henry Wilson, afterward Vice-President of the United States) and the fact that a colleague of Brooks stood, waving a pistol in each hand, to prevent any interference in behalf of Sumner. We had heard about the cruel "Mochsa" with which his back was burned in the hope of cure, and we lamented his sufferings.
John A. Andrew, afterward the War Governor of the State, was another intimate of our household, a great friend of both our parents. Genial and merry, as a rule, he yet could be sternly eloquent in the denunciation of slavery.
Indeed, it was a speech of this nature which first brought him into prominence. In the Massachusetts Legislature of 1858 the most striking figure was that of Caleb Cushing. He had been Attorney-General in President Franklin Pierce's Cabinet and was one of the ablest lawyers in the United States. When all were silent before his ​oratory and no one felt equal to opposing this master of debate, Andrew, a young advocate, was moved, like another David, to attack his Goliath. In a speech of great eloquence he vindicated the action of the Governor and the Legislature in removing from office the judge who had sent Anthony Burns back into slavery and thus outraged the conscience of the Bay State. As a lawyer he sustained his opinion by legal precedents.
"When he took his seat there was a storm of applause. The House was wild with excitement. Some members cried for joy; others cheered, waved their handkerchiefs, and threw whatever they could find into the air."
And so, like David, he won not only the battle of the day, but the leadership of his people in the stormy times that soon followed.
When a box of copperhead snakes was sent to our beloved Governor we were again indignant. (Political opponents had not then learned to send gifts of bombs.)
From Kansas itself Martin F. Conway came to us, full of fiery zeal for the Free State cause, although born south of Mason and Dixon's line. ​He later represented the young State in Congress. Samuel Downer and George L. Stearns we often saw; both were very active in the anti-slavery cause. The latter was remarkable for a very long and beautiful beard, brown and soft, like a woman's hair and reaching to his waist.
We heard burning words about the duty of Massachusetts during these assaults of the slave power. Could she endure them, or should she not rather seek to withdraw from the Union?
These words sound strangely to us now, but it must be remembered that in the fifties we had seen our fair Bay State made an annex to slave territory. Men might well ask one another, "Can the Commonwealth of Massachusetts endure the disgrace of having slave-hunts within her borders?" "The Irrepressible Conflict" had come. When the pro-slavery leaders forced the fugitive-slave law through Congress they struck a blow at the life of the nation as deadly as that of Fort Sumter. The latter was the inevitable sequel of the former.
We saw often at Green Peace another intimate friend of our parents—Theodore Parker, the famous preacher and reformer. As he wore spectacles and was prematurely bald, he did not leave upon our childish minds the impression of grandeur ​inseparably connected with Charles Sumner. Yet the splendid dome of his head gave evidence of his great intellect, while his blue eyes looked kindly and often merrily at us. Having no children of his own, he would have liked to adopt our youngest sister, could our parents have been persuaded to part with her.
Theodore Parker advocated the anti-slavery cause with great eloquence in the pulpit. He also belonged to my father's vigilance committee and harbored fugitive slaves in his own home. To one couple of runaway negroes he presented a Bible and a sword—after marrying them legally—a thing not always done in the day of slavery. My father succeeded in sending away from Boston the man who attempted to carry them back to the South, and William and Ellen Croft found freedom in England.
Theodore Parker's sermons had a powerful influence on his great congregation, of which my mother was for some time a member. In one of her tributes to him she tells us how he drew them all toward the light of a better day and prepared them also for "the war of blood and iron."
"I found that it was by the spirit of the higher humanity that he brought his hearers into sympathy with all reforms and with the better society ​that should ripen out of them. Freedom for black and white, opportunity for man and woman, the logic of conscience and the logic of progress—this was the discipline of his pulpit. . . . Before its [the Civil War's] first trumpet blast blew his great heart had ceased to beat. But a great body of us remembered his prophecy and his strategy and might have cried, as did Walt Whitman at a later date, 'O captain, my captain!'"
Rev. James Freeman Clarke, our pastor for many years, was among those whose visits gave pleasure and inspiration as well to our household. He did not hesitate to preach anti-slavery doctrines, unpopular as they were, from his pulpit. My mother says of him at this time:
"In the agitated period which preceded the Civil War and in that which followed it he in his modest pulpit became one of the leaders, not of his own flock alone, but of the community to which he belonged. I can imagine few things more instructive and desirable than was his preaching in those troublous times, so full of unanswered question and unreconciled discord."
Her beloved minister was among those who ​accompanied my mother on the visit to the army which inspired "The Battle Hymn of the Republic." This was written to the tune of:
"Old Ossawotamie Brown" was the true hero of the bloody little war in Kansas, where the Free State men finally prevailed, though many lives were lost. He has been called "Savior of Kansas and Liberator of the Slave." He came at least once to Green Peace. My mother has described her meeting with him. My father had told her some time previously about a man who "seemed to intend to devote his life to the redemption of the colored race from slavery, even as Christ had willingly offered His life for the salvation of mankind." One day he reminded her of the person so described, and added: "That man will call here this afternoon. You will receive him. His name is John Brown." . . .
Later, my mother wrote of this meeting:
"At the expected time I heard the bell ring, and, on answering it, beheld a middle-aged, middle-sized man, with hair and beard of amber color streaked with gray. He looked a Puritan of the ​Puritans, forceful, concentrated, and self-contained. We had a brief interview, of which I only remember my great gratification at meeting one of whom I had heard so good an account. I saw him once again at Dr. Howe's office, and then heard no more of him for some time."
Elsewhere she has written apropos of his raid at Harper's Ferry:
"None of us could exactly approve an act so revolutionary in its character, yet the great-hearted attempt enlisted our sympathies very strongly. The weeks of John Brown's imprisonment were very sad ones, and the day of his death was one of general mourning in New England."
With the election of Lincoln we seemed to come to smoother times. We young people certainly did not realize that we were on the brink of civil war, although friends who had visited the South warned us of the preparations going on there. If there should be any struggle, it would be a brief one, people said.
Suddenly, like a flash of lightning out of a clear sky, came the firing on Sumter. My father came triumphantly into the nursery and called out to his children: "Sumter has been fired upon! ​That's the death-blow of slavery." Little did he or we realize how long and terrible the conflict would be. But he knew that the serpent had received its death-wound. All through the long and terrible war he cheered my mother by his unyielding belief in the ultimate success of our arms.
So the prelude ended and the greater tragedy began. The conflict of ideas, the most soul-stirring period of our history, passed into the conflict of arms. In the midst of its agony the steadfast soul of a woman saw the presage of victory and gave the message, a message never to be forgotten, to her people and to the world.
* ↑ Letter from Dr. S. G. Howe to Charles Sumner.
* ↑ Journals and Letters of Samuel Gridley Howe. Dana, Estes & Co.
* ↑ History declares that a colleague of Brooks did thus stand, to prevent any one's coming to Sumner's assistance. About the pistols, I am not sure.
* ↑ Sketch of John Albion Andrew by Eben F. Stone.
* ↑ Recollections of the Anti-Slavery Struggle. By Julia Ward Howe.
* ↑ Reminiscences by Julia Ward Howe.
* ↑ From Reminiscences by Julia Ward Howe.
* ↑ Ibid.