The Ocala banner. (Ocala, Marion County, Fla.) 1883-194?, 1911-07-14
Titusville, Fla, July 5, 1911

family as for myself, to thank you
gratefully for the generous interest
you have taken lately in my unlock
edfor situation.
Then please give me space to reply,
as briefly as l can, to Governor Gill
christ's letter in your last issue.
Notwithstanding I have written,
uttered, nor instigated one word in
criticism of his doings respecting me,
/ am glad you published his private
as we'll as his public letter.
Even in response to a multitude
of letters depreciating his frantic but
unprovoked animosity toward me,
and assuring me of regard and SYM
pathy, l returned no word of COM
plant | really felt that the course
and cowardly gibes of a vulgar boar,
hundreds of miles away could reflect
no dishonOr on me personally, and as
the people had already perceived that
the attack on me was a covert and
tentative stab at the primary system,
l thought it would be foolish
ITO stir the grievance of common
man
Where age doth cloak the purpose"
But when / am pursued vindictively
to my very hearthstone, surely I am
justified in saying something in my
own defence.
Of course I cannot do this without
being, personal as to myself, and l
humbly crave your pardon and that
of your readers for this apparent
offense against a well known rule
of good manners.
My father was a Virginian. He
was in the Texas army and became
private secretary to President Mira
beau B. Lamar. He was an anti
Houston man and was opposed to the
annexation of Texas by the United
States. When General Houston sue
ceeded in bringing Texas into the
union my father left and eventually
came to live in Florida, where l was
born on the 10th of December, 1849.
My fathers brother, Judge William
Jefferson Jones, a wealthy man, was
secretary of state under President
Lamar and became the first chief
justice of the supreme court of Texas
in the days of the republic. He, too,
was opposed to annexation and quit
jublic life when General Houston &C.
complished it.
Now both these brothers were Wig
orous and long-lived men-albeit both
of them were afflicted with a defect
of the motion nerves known to the
doctors, / think, as paralysis agitans
Who their ancestors were is immater-
ial. Thomas Jefferson is alleged to
have said that his great-grandfather
might have been sheep-stealer for
all he knew or cared, and we learn
from Voltaire that it is the weak
ness of unworthy mediocrity to con-
ately lifted to high places,
My father was warm personal
friend of President Davis and was ap:
pointed by him register of the con-
federate navy. In the fall of 1864 l
was appointed a moster's mate in
the navy just before l was fifteen
years old. was examined by a strict
and competent medical man, and not
withstanding | had the hereditary
nervous defect of nay family l was
pronounced physically capable for
service and was duly sworn in by
Judge Henry ]. Stewart of Hamilton
county. Then | was ordered to re-
port at Wilmington, n c. for sea
service, but before all this could be
done Wilmington fell and / was thus
cut off from seeing whether l was
too shaky of hand to aim a gun or
not.
Meantime my father officially is
sued or had to do with all the letters
of Marque and ReprisaI ordered by
Mr.. Davis. 1t is we'll known that a
strong party in the north were clam
oring for President Davis to be tried
for piracy on the basis of these let
tiers of Marque. My father was
charged with destroying the record of
his office and imprisoned that he
might be compelled to testify con-
corning it and kept confined under
unspeakable circumstances until Gen
eral Grant ordered him released. My
father had been an editor and as a
boy had read the anti-belIum TRADE
of Horace against the south
In 1872, contrasting Greeley's
course with General Grants conduct
at Appamotox, and having in mind
my fathers deliverance, it seemed to
my young judgment to be a compar-
ison between a demon and a saint.
Wrong though it may have been, | es-