The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1902-12-01
DEATH OF SEP. WINNER
Man Who Once Wrote the Nations
Songs
Songs

she called the baby names and mumbled
kisses on its face, as mothers do SO long
as the ba bies stand IL.
Several years afterward Sep Winner
was going home one winter night, when
ne saw this baby-nOw little grown, of
course-sitting on the doorstep, shivering
with cold Then he remembered that the
mother had died a few days before, and
that the father had hired a servant girl
to care for the little one
Winner stopped and said: Where is
our father, my dear
He's gone out was the reply.
And where's the giri?"
Shes gone out, too, SIR
coId?'
Il am waiting here for my mamma y
Instantly Sep Winner flung his arms
his own warm and cosy household, where
a tender mother was caring for her own
boys.
Midnight had not come before the
words of the song, What Is Home With
out a Mother?' were written and not
long afterwards all the land was singing
them
Incurred the Enmity Of Stanton.
But Winner also had vicissitudes
When the army of the Potomac was one
OF the hands with which the federal gov
eminent sought to clinch together afresh
a disrupted Union, Sep Winner wrote a
song which incurred the implacabIe en-
nifty OF Secretary Stanton
1t was called Give Us Back Our Old
Commander, and it referred of course
to the removal of Mcclellan from the
command OF the army of the Potomac.
winner happened TO be in Washington
when the men of Little Macs COM
mand swept along Pennsylvania avenue
shouting hoarsely: .'Give us back out Lit
tie Mac!' The rhythm of the line beat in
his ears until he reached home Then he
sat down and wrote:
Give as back our old commander,
Little Mac, the peoples pride;
Let the army and the nation
In their choice be satisfied
1t was not great poetry, but it crystal
lied national feeling, and within a week
$1,000 copies of the ballad had been sold
week more and they were fluttering
throughout the army of the Potomac,
each word a menace to the counsel pre-
vailing at Washington.
Sang it to General Burnside.
Around eampfires by night and on the
march by day. echoing in the very ears
of Burnside, who displayed his Inability
to cope with Lee. the strains of that pro-
testing song welled from 100000 threats.
II was nothing more than protest. but
stanton, secretary OF war, realized that
1t invited characterization. He issued an
order making both the circulation and
the singing of the ballad reasonable Of
tenses. A few days passed and one of
staff of Colonel Boxer, appeared at Win
ners home and arrested him.
You go to Fort Lafayette and stay
there with the other rebels was the
greeting of this officer
Taken before a military tribunal Win
ner, seeing no chance for clemency, prom
ised to discontinue the sale of the song
if given his liberty. This was done, but
again the wisdom of the quotation at
the head of this article was proved. Law
could stop the sale of the ballad, but It
could not stop the singing, which still was
heard throughout the length and breadth
of the country
Made Little Money From Songs.
Winner was his own first publisher,
because he had not the Self-conf idence to
submit his compositions to an established
house. But it was not long before he re-
ceived invitations to do so. Lee & Walk
er then issued his songs and it was that
firm that put the 'Mocking Bird out to
the public It was a Philadelphia house
and was succeeded by Ditson & Co. who
have since controlled Winners compost
lions.
Winner never made much money out of
his songs, because he usually sold them
outright. In his later days however he
devoted himself to books on methods OF
teaching and his Eureka series, sold on
royalties, brought him large profits.
For time he conducted music store
with partner named ShuSter. and after
ward by himself. but lately he devoted
himself to teaching at his house in North
Sixteenth street
He was always genial and everybody
loved him. His personality as well as
his music, seemed to reach the popular
heart Sep Winner dies mourned by
many.