The only counties in the state in which the Danites showed any vitality were Union County in the south and Bureau County in the north. They polled only 5079 votes in the whole state.
The influence of the Eastern Republicans, who were inclined to support Douglas at the beginning of the campaign, and especially that of the New York Tribune, is noted by Judd and Herndon.
N. B. Judd, Chicago, July 16:
We have lost some Republicans in this region.... You may attribute it to the course of the New York Tribune, which has tended to loosen party ties and induce old Whigs to look upon D.'s return to the Senate as rather desirable. You ought to come to Illinois as soon as you can by way of New York and straighten out the newspapers there. Even the Evening Post compares Douglas to Silas Wright. Bah!
W. H. Herndon, Springfield, July 22:
There were some Republicans here—more than we had any idea of—who had been silently influenced by Greeley, and who intended to go for Douglas or not take sides against him. His speech here aroused the old fires and now they are his enemies. Has received a letter from Greeley in which he says: "Now, Herndon, I am going to do all I reasonably can to elect Lincoln."
N. B. Judd, Chicago, December 26 (after the election), says:
Horace Greeley has been here lecturing and doing what mischief he could. He took Tom Dyer [Democrat, ex-mayor] into his confidence and told him all the party secrets that he knew, such as that we had been East and endeavored to get money for the canvass and that we failed, etc.;—a beautiful chap he is, to be entrusted with the interests of a party. Lecturing is a mere pretense. He is running around to our small towns with that pretense, but really to head off the defection from his paper. It is being stopped by hundreds.
A. Jonas, Quincy, same date: