Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2

by George Frisbie Hoar

I had from my mother the story of General Washington taking Chief Justice Ellsworth's twin children, one on each knee, and reciting to them the ballad of the Derbyshire Ram. This tradition has remained in the Ellsworth family. I have confirmed it by inquiry of the Rev. Mr. Wood, a grandson of Oliver Ellsworth, who died in Washington a few years ago.

Besides the uncle to whom I allude, who died in 1856, Judge Simeon Baldwin, who married two of my aunts, died in 1851, aged ninety. He was a Member of Congress in 1803-5, and was an intimate friend of Chancellor Kent, who was his classmate and chum in Yale, and was intimate with the Federalist leaders of the Hamilton party. I several times made visits in his household before his death. President Jeremiah Day, another uncle by marriage, was at the head of Yale for thirty years. He died in 1867, at the age of 94.

My mother's sister, Mrs. Jeremiah Evarts, was born January 28, 1774, and died in 1851, at the age of seventy-seven. She knew intimately many famous men and women of the Revolutionary period. Her husband was an intimate friend of John Jay. She had a great deal of the sprightly wit for which her son, William, was so famous. She was at home at the time of Washington's visit, then a child eleven years old, and opened the door for him when he took his leave. The General, who was very fond of children, put his hand on her head and said, "My little lady, I wish you a better office." She dropped a courtesy and answered, quick as lightning, "Yes, sir; to let you in."

Mrs. Evarts was a woman not only of sprightly wit, but of great beauty. She liked to tell in her old age of a dinner which John Hancock gave for her father and her, in Boston, when she was a girl. She described her dress with great minuteness, and added naively, "Didn't I look pretty?"

My mother, who was married in 1812, knew very intimately many of her father's and mother's old friends who had been distinguished in the public service in the Revolutionary period and the Administration of Washington and John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. She knew very well the family of John Jay. He and his wife were visitors at my grandmother's after their return from Spain. My mother was intimate in the household of Oliver Ellsworth as in a second home. His children were her playmates. She was also very intimate indeed with the family of Senator Hillhouse, whose daughter Mary was one of her dearest friends.

Senator Hillhouse held a very high place in the public life of Connecticut in his day. He was one of the friends of Hamilton, and one of the group of Federal statesmen of whom Hamilton was the leader. He was United States Senator for Connecticut from 1796 to 1810.

After she became a young lady, my mother, with Fanny Ellsworth, afterward Mrs. Wood, and Mary Hillhouse, daughter of the Senator, established a school to teach young colored children to read and sew. The colored people in New Haven were in a sad condition in those days. The law of the State made it a penal offence to teach a colored child to read. These girls violated the law. The public authorities interfered and threatened them with prosecution. But the young women were resolute. They insisted that they were performing a religious duty, and declared that they should disobey the law and take the consequences. A good deal of sympathy was aroused in their behalf. The New Haven authorities had to face the question whether they would imprison the daughter of a Signer of the Declaration of Independence, who had affixed his signature to the great affirmation that all men are created equal, the daughters of two Framers of the Constitution, and the daughter of James Hillhouse, then the foremost citizen of Connecticut, for teaching little children to read the Bible. They gave up the attempt. The school kept on and flourished. President Dwight raised a considerable fund for it by a course of lectures, and it continued down to within my own recollection. What became of the fund which was raised for its support I cannot tell.

Jeremiah Evarts was born February 13, 1781. He died May 10, 1831. He was the founder and Secretary of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. He was one of the thirteen men who met in Samuel Dexter's office in 1812, to inaugurate the Temperance Reformation. The habit of excessive drinking was then almost universal in this country. Liquors and wines were freely used on social occasions, at weddings and at funerals. The clergyman staggered home from his round of pastoral calls, and the bearers partook of brandy or gin or rum in the room adjoining that where the coffin was placed ready for the funeral. A gentleman present said it was utterly impracticable to try and wean the American people from the habit of drinking. Jeremiah Evarts answered, "It is right, therefore practicable."

He was a Puritan of the old school. He made a vigorous but ineffectual attempt in Connecticut to enforce the Sunday laws. His death was caused by his exertions in resisting the removal of the Cherokee Indians from Georgia, a removal accomplished in violation of the Constitution and of public faith. The Supreme Court of the United States declared the law of Georgia unconstitutional. But Georgia defied the mandate of the Court, and it was never executed. The missionary agent was imprisoned and died of his confinement. Mr. Evarts said, "There is a court that has power to execute its judgments."

I told this story to Horace Maynard, an eminent member of Congress and a member of the Cabinet. Mr. Maynard said, "There was never a prophecy more terribly accomplished. The territory from which those Indians were unlawfully removed was the scene of the Battle of Missionary Ridge, which is not far from the grave of Worcester, the missionary who died in prison. That land was fairly drenched with blood and honeycombed with graves."