The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1881-05-12
Gen. John S. Preston.


General John S. Preston died at his
residence in Columbia on Sunday morn.
ing, few minutes before 10 o'clock of
corrhosis of the liver. His health had
been declining for months, his symptoms
being much aggravated by recent domes-
tic Affections. He did not quit his busi-
ness, however, until Tuesday, the 18th of
April, from which time he was confined
to his home. The following sketch of his
life and labors is taken from the Nelcs and
Courier:
The twelve years which saw the rise
and fall of the Southern Confederacy,
the enfranchisement of the slaves, and
the crown and combination of govern
mental debauchery in South Carolina
were crowded with sharp and striking
contrasts. In none of these, was the
irony of fate more poignantly manifest
than when the stately mansion in Colum-
bin which had been the sweet home of
courtly john S. Preston became the
scene of the revels of Franklin J. Moses.
What Columbia had been John S. Pres
ton has told: "How beautiful the dear
old town was, with its quiet, deep
shaded streets, its comfortable, CHEEKY
looking houses surrounded by gardens
bright with evergreens, and gorgeous
with flowers redolent of Natures sweetest
incense. It's people happy, cheerful and
busy in honest and prosperous toll.
We all knew each other and every one
trusted his neighbor, and gentle Charity
waved her wand and sceptre over U.s."
A woeful change there was when John S.
Preston saw the capital of the State on
one March morning in 1865: I'm hunt
ing for morsel of food for my wife and
children, I lost my way among the smol-
dering and still smoking ruins, and was
sickened by the stencil of decay and
death. The conqueror was in the Capt.
tol there, and in that temple. He was
in your house and mine, and we were
shelterless. Like Sylla, at Athens, he
did not come here to learn our past his.
tory, but to punish rebels, and, of course,
be could not pardon the living for the sake
of the dead" The years glided by. Pre-.
cocious vice and chronic stupidity ruled
the State. The eagerness of freedom
exhibited itself in the liberty to do wrong
and in the ingenuity to invent new forms
of chicanery. The "Robber Governor"
safe upon and owned the hearth of the
Prestons. Not for long. Time has set
it right. In distant city, dead to honor
and virtue, Moses turks in poverty and
shame. John S. Preston sleeps, in
honor, in the midst of a people to every
article of whose creed he was unswerv-
ingly and unalterably true.
John S. Preston, brother of Senator
VIM. @. Preston, was born near Abing-
don, Va, in April, 1909, and came to
South Carolina before he was of age. In
1881 he married Miss Caroline Hampton,
step.aunt of Senator Wade Hampton,
and celebrated his golden wedding this
spring. Mr.. Preston's own fortune was
not large, but his wife owned sugar estates
in Louisiana, which were valued, before
the war, at million dollars. At this
price the property was sold, but on ac-
count of the war, the payments, we be-
lieve, were not completed. Mr.. Pres
! toms political career was confined to
! representing Richland County in the
State Senate for several years before the
war the eloquence which soon became
conspicuous was first displayed in a
speech against the reduction of the
appropriation for the State Lunatic Asy-
lum. At the beginning of the Confeder-
ate war he served on Gen. Beauregard's
staff in Virginia, being Volunteer
aide.de-camp at the first Battle of
Manassas. Afterwards he was transferred
to Columbia as comnandant ofa division
of the Conscript Bureau. His success
was SO marked and displayed such exc.
cutive ability that he was afterwards
placed in charge of the Conscript Bureau
at Richmond, with the rank of Brigadier-
general. This position he held until the
end of the struggle. At that time he
was greatly reduced in fortune, and he
has since been in moderate circumstances
only. In 1866 he went to France, where he
spent three years in the education of his
children. Upon his return he took no
part in public affairs, but became Presi-
dent of the Central National Bank. The
only other public Office he held was that
of Chairman of the Board of Trustees of
the University of South Carolina, having
been elected three years ago.
The heart of Gen. Preston was bound
up in the Lost Cause, and at no time did
he make any attempt to adapt himself to
defeat with its consequences. The South
was right, and being right should have
established its independence. Having
failed to do this, the right was still right,
and the conquered must deport them
selves always as the victims of
inexplicable and incomprehensible
fate. This immobility of spirit
naturally put Gen. Preston out Of
tune with the times. In the Grafton be
delivered at the University of Virginia,
in 1875, ten years after the surrender, he
said distinctly: "Not space or time, or
the convenience of any human law, or
the power Of any human arm, can recon-
cile institutions for the turbulent fanatics
of Plymouth Rock and the God-praying
Christians of Jamestown. The
iMayRower freight, under the laws of
England, was heresy and crime; the
jamestown emigrant was an English
freeman, loyal to his country and his
God, with England's honor in his heart
and English piety in his SOUL" The
Pilgrim Fathers lett England tor the
lucre of traffic." the Southern colonists
"to obtain more perfect law ofliberty."
The robes of Washington, he said, were
''stolen and mis6tted" on the shoulders of
the elder Adams. The people of New
England he declared to be "adverse to
the principles of English constitutional
liberty and of English religious freedom"
IT, Co,thor,or, 70 visit tbo Moth U;o m
crawl on our bellies to negro and New
England temples, and at the outer
gates pray them, not to give US
Back our happy homes, not to give US
back our slaughtered children, not to
give us back our perfect liberty, but to
let us be of them, that we, too, may cele.
brate at their altar with warbled hymns
and forced hallelujahs, and breathe for
them ambrosial odo1s, our base and SER
vile offerings" Later on, in speech at