The Story of Garfield / Farm-boy, Soldier, and President

by William G. Rutherford

Mrs. James Garfield.

Thirty-five times a ballot had been taken, and they seemed no nearer than before. But at the thirty-fifth it was found that one name had received about fifty votes. When that name was read, it was greeted with a mighty cheer, which grew louder and louder, until the whole of the vast building resounded with the name of James A. Garfield. Another ballot was taken, and Garfield was found to be the chosen of his party.

He was nominated as the Republican candidate; and on November 2, 1880, the "little sapling" of the Western Reserve became the President of the United States, the uncrowned monarch of one of the greatest nations of the world. Thus had he marched along. At fourteen he was working at the carpenter's bench; at sixteen he was a canal boatman; two years later he entered the Chester school; at twenty-one he was a common school teacher.

Then in his twenty-third year he entered the university, graduating three years afterwards. At twenty-seven he became principal of the Hiram Institute. The next year he was a Member of the Ohio Senate. At thirty-one he was at the head of a regiment; at thirty-two, a major-general; at thirty-three, a Member of Congress; at forty-eight he was made a Member of the National Senate; and at fifty he became President of the United States.

We have said that the secret of Garfield's success was his integrity. To this he owed the respect which advanced him to each position of trust until it made him head of the Government. And it was to this noble quality of his character that he owed his death. Corruption had grown up in connection with the offices of State, and Garfield's last mission was to purge the Government of this taint. He was resolved to set his face against "the waste of time and the obstruction to public business caused by the greedy crowd of office-seekers." And he also announced that "rigid honesty and faithful service would be required from every officer of the State."

This conduct bitterly annoyed some of his own party, who had expected that Garfield would follow the example of other Presidents, and turn out all the civic officers, to make room for his own friends. This annoyance at length found expression in the wicked act of a wretched creature, a disappointed office-seeker, named Guiteau.

The new President had been but a few months in office, when Guiteau followed him into the railway station at Washington, and, as he entered the waiting-room, shot him in the back. The President fell wounded, but not unconscious. In great pain, he still remembered his loved ones, and moaned, "My poor wife and children." Then he dictated a message to his wife.

A struggle with death ensued, on which the whole world looked with awe.

For weeks the President hovered between life and death, showing ever the same sublime spirit of cheerful patience and Christian resignation which had adorned his life. At length the end came, and on the 19th of September 1881 he fell asleep. His body was removed to Washington, where he was laid in state. On the bier a wreath of white roses rested, bearing the simple inscription—"From Queen Victoria to the memory of the late President Garfield, an expression of her sorrow, and her sympathy with Mrs. Garfield and the American nation."

Through that room passed a hundred and thirty thousand persons of all ranks, to take one last look at the man whose life had been so great, and whose dying had been so glorious. Then in the cemetery of his native Cleveland, James A. Garfield was laid to rest.

The spontaneous affection of his countrymen amply provided for his beloved family; and his martyrdom, it was said, did more than any other event could have done to draw the North and South together. His death was mourned, and the manner of it hated by every section and party alike, and the whole nation, united now in sorrow, bowed in loving tenderness over the grave of one of its greatest children.

CHAPTER XX.

LOOKING BACK.

One of the pleasantest things in the story of Garfield is the devotion of friends and companions, which followed and helped him all his life. To an orphan lad, the son of a poor widow in the backwoods of the State of Ohio, there seemed little chance of greatness; and yet out of that poor cabin in the woods, in which sat the weeping mother and her four fatherless children, came one who was destined to stand among princes.

It was the self-denial of his mother, elder brother, and sister which made it possible for James Garfield to rise. When the father died suddenly, leaving his family on the comparatively new clearing, Thomas, the eldest son, became the manager of the farm. "I can plough and plant, mother. I can sow the wheat too, and cut the wood, milk the cows, and do heaps of things for you."