The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1903-12-31
STRANGE CAREER OF NOTED MAN
Gov. Francis Thomas Was Brilliant and
Odd-Lived Life of Reeluse.
Baltimore, Dec. IS, 1904.


Some writer in one of the daily
newspapers who is of a reminis-
cent mind, has contributed the
following which no doubt was i'll
spired by the destruction by fire of
the house of the late Governor
Francis Thomas in this county:
Three men of the family name of
Thomas have figured prominently
in the history of Maryland-Philip
Evan, who was the organizer and
first president of the Baltimore and
Ohio railroad company; Francis,
who was governor and congress
man, and Philip Francis, who was
governor, a secretary of the United
States Treasury, and who was cleo
ted to the United States Senate
at the close of the War, but who
was refused his sea. because of his
pro-Southern sympathy.
Of this trio of Thomases, none
of whom was related to the other.
Francis Thomas was in his day
the most noted, not only because
of his achievements, but also be-
cause of his strange characteristics.
His was a peculiar career and the
career of no man in public life in
the United States has its parallel.
He withdrew from contact with
the world at the zenith of his pow
er, remained hidden in his hermit
home in the mountains of Garrett,
then Allegany county, for many
years and then emerged from his
retreat into public life again, being
elected to Congress.
The burning of that hermit home
a few nights ago recalls the strange
viCissitudes in its formeroccupant's
career. Here are some of the strik-
ing incidents, events and achieve
ments:
Member of the Maryland House
of Delegates when % years old
and speaker in 1929.
President of the Chesapeake and
Ohio Canal in 1889.
Governor of the state from I84I
to 1914.
Member of the National House
Of Representatives for IS years, or
nine terms, serving five terms as
Democrat and four terms, during
and after the Civil War, as a Re-
publican.
Member of the State Constitu-
tional Convention of 1850.
Collector of internal revenue.
Minister to Peru.
His investigation of the old
United States Bank led to its down.
fall and caused President Andrew
Jackson to entertain a high regard
for him.
AS member OF Congress he was
instrumental in having the United
States Naval Academy located at
Annapolis.
These events are not named in
chronological order nor in the or
der of their Importance. They are
enumerated to illustrate his varied
and useful career.
But of all the vicissitudes which
mark his career, that which most
shaped his course after he reached
middle life was Thomas quarrel
with his wife (they we're never
happily mated), a quarrel which
robbed him Of the Democratic NOM
ination for vice president, when
that honor went to Dallas in 1874,
for the nation would not tolerate
the scandal which the domestic
trouble had caused. There we're
even whisperiEgs of the husbands
cruelty, of lashii gs and of beatings.
1t was a domestic tragedy, a
tragedy which drove Thomas into
the solitude of the fastness of the
>Alleghenies, where he sought to
hide his face from the gaze of his
fellow-man. There in the home
just burned he passed miserable
existence for years, a lonely ex-
istence which began with tragedy
and ended in tragedy, for standing
on the tracks of the Baltimore and
and Ohio railroad during the early
seventies he was struck by a loco
motive and killed.