GEN. HENRY W. BEESON.
Hon. Andrew Stewart, of Uniontown, who served many years in Congress, beginning with 1820, was, next to Mr. Clay, the most widely known and influential congressional friend of the road, and in earnestness and persistency in this behalf, not excelled even by Mr. Clay. Hon. T. M. T. McKennan, an old congressman of Washington, Pennsylvania, was likewise a staunch friend of the road, carefully guarding its interests and pressing its claims upon the favorable consideration of Congress. Gen. Henry W. Beeson, of Uniontown, who represented the Fayette and Greene district of Pennsylvania in Congress in the forties, was an indomitable friend of the road. He stoutly opposed the extension of the Baltimore and Ohio railroad west of Cumberland, through Pennsylvania, and was thoroughly sustained by his constituents. In one of his characteristic speeches on the subject, he furnished a careful estimate of the number of horse-shoes made by the blacksmiths along the road, the number of nails required to fasten them to the horses’ feet, the number of bushels of grain and tons of hay furnished by the farmers to the tavern keepers, the vast quantity of chickens, turkeys, eggs and butter that found a ready market on the line, and other like statistical information going to show that the National Road would better subserve the public weal than a steam railroad. This view at the time, and in the locality affected, was regarded as correct, which serves as an illustration of the change that takes place in public sentiment, as the wheels of time revolve and the ingenuity of man expands. Lewis Steenrod, of the Wheeling district, was likewise an able and influential congressional friend of the road. He was the son of Daniel Steenrod, an old tavernkeeper on the road, near Wheeling; and the Cumberland, Maryland, district always sent men to Congress who favored the preservation and maintenance of the road. Hon. Daniel Sturgeon, who served as a senator of the United States for the State of Pennsylvania from 1840 to 1852, was also an undeviating and influential friend of the road. He gave unremitting attention and untiring support to every measure brought before the Senate during his long and honorable service in that body, designed to make for the road’s prosperity, and preserve and maintain it as the nation’s great highway. His home was in Uniontown, on the line of the road, and he was thoroughly identified with it alike in sentiment and interest. He was not a showy statesman, but the possessor of incorruptible integrity and wielded an influence not beneath that of any of his compeers, among whom were that renowned trio of Senators, Clay, Webster and Calhoun.
Frequent references will be made in these pages to the Old Braddock Road, but it is not the purpose of the writer to go into the history of that ancient highway. This volume is devoted exclusively to the National Road. We think it pertinent, however, to remark that Braddock’s Road would have been more appropriately named Washington’s Road. Washington passed over it in command of a detachment of Virginia troops more than a year before Braddock ever saw it. Mr. Veech, the eminent local historian, says that Braddock’s Road and Nemicolon’s Indian trail are identical, so that Nemicolon, the Indian, would seem to have a higher claim to the honor of giving name to this old road than General Braddock. However, time, usage and common consent unite in calling it Braddock’s Road, and, as a rule, we hold it to be very unwise, not to say downright foolishness, to undertake to change old and familiar names. It is difficult to do, and ought not to be done.
From the time it was thrown open to the public, in the year 1818, until the coming of railroads west of the Allegheny mountains, in 1852, the National Road was the one great highway, over which passed the bulk of trade and travel, and the mails between the East and the West. Its numerous and stately stone bridges with handsomely turned arches, its iron mile posts and its old iron gates, attest the skill of the workmen engaged on its construction, and to this day remain enduring monuments of its grandeur and solidity, all save the imposing iron gates, which have disappeared by process of conversion prompted by some utilitarian idea, savoring in no little measure of sacrilege. Many of the most illustrious statesmen and heroes of the early period of our national existence passed over the National Road from their homes to the capital and back, at the opening and closing of the sessions of Congress. Jackson, Harrison, Clay, Sam Houston, Polk, Taylor, Crittenden, Shelby, Allen, Scott, Butler, the eccentric Davy Crockett, and many of their contemporaries in public service, were familiar figures in the eyes of the dwellers by the roadside. The writer of these pages frequently saw these distinguished men on their passage over the road, and remembers with no little pride the incident of shaking hands with General Jackson, as he sat in his carriage on the wagon-yard of an old tavern. A coach, in which Mr. Clay was proceeding to Washington, was upset on a pile of limestone, in the main street of Uniontown, a few moments after supper at the McClelland house. Sam Sibley was the driver of that coach, and had his nose broken by the accident. Mr. Clay was unhurt, and upon being extricated from the grounded coach, facetiously remarked that: “This is mixing the Clay of Kentucky with the limestone of Pennsylvania.”
As many as twenty-four horse coaches have been counted in line at one time on the road, and large, broad-wheeled wagons, covered with white canvass stretched over bows, laden with merchandise and drawn by six Conestoga horses, were visible all the day long at every point, and many times until late in the evening, besides innumerable caravans of horses, mules, cattle, hogs and sheep. It looked more like the leading avenue of a great city than a road through rural districts.
HON. DANIEL STURGEON.