The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1890-09-10

grants-it being the first made up of fami-
| lies that came for bona fide settlement.
| He chose his home on Mount Dread. west
of the site of Lawrence, from which he had
viewed the promised land five years before.
The history of the territory from the time
( OF his arrival to the time of the admission
| of Kansas as a state, is fraught with more
interest TO the student of American history
than that of any former period in the an
nails of the country, and through 1t all
runs the quiet life of Charles Robinson,
who, himself the originator, organizer and
| leader of the Free State movement, stood
through evil and good repute as the bull
wark against which the assaults of foes
| from without and within beat with I'M
ceaslng but unavailing force until the final
victory was won. The story is told all too
imperfectly. in the accompanying pages.
He was the first governor chosen under
the Topeka constitution, and the first COM
mander-in-chief of the free state MALTA
He held the organization with a skill and
wisdom peculiar to his own, as final
place of refuge for the free state men of
Kansas, until, with growing strength they
could transform it into a valid form of
government under the forms of law. The
Wyandotte constitution, under the forced
recognition of congress, having been
adopted, he was, under the provisions
chosen the first governor of the free state
Of Kansas. and, in that position, organized
under the laws the military forces upon a
war basis, for the final struggle in which
Kansas troops won fresh laurels and i'm
perishable renown. For the cause of free
dom in Kansas he suffered imprisonment,
destruction of property, defamation of
character, and all the minor annoyances
which hatred of merit, political ambition,
or internecine party strife could engender.
He has outlived it all, and, conquerOr
a "a = harOqC 4 no
quiet and unassuming life beftting the
station which, in the yet unwritten his
tory of Kansas his country, will be ac-
corded him.
After the destruction of his home in
Mount Dread, at the time of the sack of
Lawrecce in 1856, he did not rebuild. His
present home is on a beautiful farm some
three miles north of the city of Lawrence.
Since the close of his gubernatorial term
in 1868, he has taken no leading part in the
politics of the state or nation, and has
ceased to be in accord of fellowship with
either of the dominant political parties.
lie was never a party politician, and still
holds sturdily to the independent thought
and action which characterized him
through life, and which only men of the
highest type have the courage or principle
TO consistently follow.
q. Douglass Beaverton, a correspondent
of the New York Herald, gave the follow
ing sketch of Governor Robinson in 1856:
He may be regarded as a real head-the
thinking one we mean-aDd main
spring of the FreeState party; or
to speak more correctly, of all that
party who are worth anything. We be-
Heve him to be a keen, shrewd, far-Seeing
man, who would permit nothing TO stand
IN the way of the end he desired TO gain.
He Is, moreover. cool and determined, and
appears to be endowed with immense firm
Oh
man now; but conservative rather from
policy than from principle. He seems to
have strong common sense and good or
binary brain, but no brilliancy of talent
In fact, TO sum Gov. Robinson up in a sin
gle sentence, we consider him the most
dangerous enemy which the pro-slavery
party has to encounter in Kansas. In per
son he is tall, well made, and more than
ordinarily handsome; gentlemanly, but by
no meants winning in his manners, with
one of those cold, Keen blue eyes that seem
to look you through" The above sketch
was not Overdrawn.
Mr.. Robinson was married in Novem-
Der, lS43, to Miss Sarah Adams. daughter
of William Adams, of West Brooktield
Mass. Two children were born to them,
both of whom died in infancy. Mrs.
Robinson died January Il, 1915. October
30, 1851, he married Miss Sarah T. l..
Lawrence, daughter of Hon. Myron Law
renee, an eminent lawyer and statesman
of Massachusetts. Her mother was
Clarissa Dwight Lawrence. She was one
Of the New England family of Dwights,
of western Massachusetts,, Of which Presi-
dent Dwight of Yale college is worthy
scion. She is the author of kansas: its
Interior and Exterior Life" a book which
in its time was not an unworthy rival of
Uncle Toms Cabin, and did scarcely less
in its sphere to rouse the northern heart in
the early years of the Kansas struggle
Her history and character. so far as iden-
titled with the history of the common
wealth, appears elsewhere.
Governor Robinson has no living
children.