The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1920-05-03
BY JAMES MORGAN

4 NDREW JACKSON, the inlet
~ tered backwoodsman, treading
at the heels of John Quincy
Adams, the most cultured in all the
line, presents the sharpest contrast to
be seen in the procession of Pres
idents.
The first President born in log
cabin. Jackson could not claim as his
own even that lowly dwelling in the
North Carolina forest. but entered the
world homeless and fatherless. Sprung
from poor Irish immigrants, his par
ents had been in the contry only two
years when the father sank into an
unmarked grave a few days before
Andrews birth. leaving his family
without a roof or an acre.
With her two little boys who had
been born in the old country, the ex-
pectant mother took refuge in the
home of an invalid sister. where she
served as housckeeper and brought up
her children. 1t was her ambition to
educate Andrew for the Presbyterian
ministry, but small and poor was the
schooling she was able TO give him.
The most he ever learned was from
men rather than from books, the Vicar
of Wakefield being the only work of
IL tSi az ul z llidl Ilt - hlON ~ nave
read in the whole course of his
life.
The first teacher to make an i'm
preston upon Andrew Jackson was
the American Revolution, which filed
his breast with a passionate devotion
to his country and a flaming hatred of
its enemies. Among the newly landed
Irish and Scotch who mostly peopled
hi ri nf hn
conflict became a furious war between
the clans. with raiding bands hunting
one another through the wild forests,
leaving behind them a trail redeemed
by blood and fire.
Into that mad strife between neigh
bors, Andrew was plunged at an age
when most boys cannot qualify even
for the mimic combats of the football
field. At 4, he was dashing about on
his shaggy pony, popping them" with
his muSket, as he said. Taken captive,
he was SCARED for life by the sword
of a British officer, whose muddy
boots he Indignantly refused to brush.
Thrown into a foul prison camp, he
suffered from a virulent attack of
smallpox that for a time left him a
maniac.
No other among American leaders
received from the War of Indepen-
dence such a legacy of bitter memories
as it bequeathed to Jackson. That
savage struggle between Wing and
Tory swept away his brave mother and
both of his brothers; scattered his
kindred and left him, at 10, alone in
| the world.
A ragged, rowing waif of the Revo,
| luton, he grew up as wild as weed
with no hand above him, his high
spirits led him into the temptations
of his primitive world, whose social
standards were 200 years behind the
times. Drinking, and carousing
gambling, cock fighting and horse
racing young Jackson never took a
Care, the rustic sport once stalking his
horse and his all on a throw of the
dice. A bully among rowdes, he went
| his registering way along a road that
is not to be laid down on the map OF
conduct as course to the White
House.
Still the story points the moral that
if a young man will only keep going
ne will leave the follies of youth be
hind him. Jackson's faults were the
vices of his rough surroundings and
they changed with changing circum
| stances. His simple virtues were
drawn from the same rude environ