Lincoln's speeches at this time were not confined to his own State. He made several in Indiana, being invited thither by prominent Whig politicians who had heard him speak in Illinois. The first and most important of his meetings in Indiana was at Bruceville. The Democrats, learning of the proposed Whig gathering, arranged one, for the same evening, with Lieutenant William W. Carr of Vincennes as speaker. As might have been expected from the excited state of politics at the moment, the proximity of the two mass-meetings aroused party loyalty to a fighting pitch. "Each party was determined to break up the other's speaking," writes Miss O'Flynn, in a description of the Bruceville meeting prepared for this Magazine from interviews with those who took part in it. "The night was made hideous with the rattle of tin pans and bells and the blare of cow-horns. In spite of all the din and uproar of the younger element, a few grown-up male radicals and partisan women sang and cheered loudly for their favorites, who kept on with their flow of political information. Lieutenant Carr stood in his carriage, and addressed the crowd around him, while a local politician acted as grand marshal of the night, and urged the yelling Democratic legion to surge to the schoolhouse, where Abraham Lincoln was speaking, and run the Whigs from their headquarters. Old men now living, who were big boys then, cannot remember any of the burning eloquence of either speaker. As they now laughingly express it: 'We were far more interested in the noise and fussing than the success of the speakers, and we ran backward and forward from one camp to the other.'
Fortunately, the remaining speeches in Indiana were made under more dignified conditions. One was delivered at Rockport; another "from the door of a harness shop" near Gentryville, Lincoln's old home in Indiana; and a third at the "Old Carter School" in the same neighborhood. At the delivery of the last many of Lincoln's old neighbors were present, and they still tell of the cordial way in which he greeted them and of the interest he showed in every familiar spot.
"'I was a young fellow,' Mr. Redmond Grigsby says, 'and took a long time to get to the speaking. When I got to the out-skirts of the crowd, Mr. Lincoln saw me, and called out: "If that isn't Red Grigsby, then I'm a ghost." He then came through the crowd and met me. We shook hands and talked a little. His speech was good, and was talked about for a long while around in this section. The last words of his speech at the Carter schoolhouse were: 'My fellow-citizens, I may not live to see it, but give us protective tariff, and we will have the greatest country on the globe.'"
"After the speaking was over, Mr. Josiah Crawford invited Abraham Lincoln and John W. Lamar to go home with him. As they rode along, Mr. Lincoln talked over olden times. He asked about a saw pit in which he had worked when a young boy. Mr. Crawford said it was still in existence, and that he would drive around near it. The three men, Lincoln, Crawford, and Lamar, went up into the woods where the old pit was. It had partly fallen down; the northwest corner, where Lincoln used to stand when working, was propped up by a large forked stick against a tree. Mr. Lincoln said: 'This looks more natural than I thought it would after so many years since I worked here.' During the time spent at Mr. Crawford's home, Mr. Lincoln went around inspecting everything."[6]
So vivid were the memories which this visit to Gentryville aroused, so deep were Lincoln's emotions, that he even attempted to express them in verse.
The Rev. Peter Cartwright, the most famous itinerant preacher of the pioneer era, was born in Amherst County, Virginia, on James River, September 1, 1785. His father was a Revolutionary soldier, and soon after peace was declared the family moved to the wildest region of Kentucky. The migrating party consisted of two hundred families, guarded by an armed escort of one hundred men. Peter was a wild boy; but in his sixteenth year he was persuaded by his mother to join the Methodist Church. He at once displayed a wonderful talent for exhorting, and at the age of seventeen he became a licensed exhorter. A year later he became a regular travelling preacher. His reputation soon spread over Kentucky and Ohio. He hated slavery, and in 1823, to get into a free State, he and his wife (he had married Frances Gaines in 1808) and their seven children removed to Illinois. They settled in the Sangamon valley, near Springfield. For the next forty years he travelled over the State, most of the time on horseback, preaching the gospel in his unique and rugged fashion. His district was at first so large (extending from Kaskaskia to Galena) that he was unable to traverse the whole of it in the same year. He was elected to the legislature in 1828 and again in 1832; Lincoln, in the latter year, being an opposing candidate. In 1846 he was the Democratic nominee for Congress against Lincoln, and was badly beaten. Peter Cartwright enjoyed, perhaps, a larger personal acquaintance with the people of Illinois than any other man ever had. His name was familiar in every household in the West. Up to 1856 (he wrote an autobiography in that year) he had baptized twelve thousand persons and preached five hundred funeral sermons. His personality was quaint and original. A native vigor of intellect largely overbalanced the lack of education. He was a great wit, and often said startling things. His religion sometimes bordered upon fanaticism. He was fearless and aggressive, and was no respecter of persons. It was not a rare thing for him to descend from the pulpit, and by sheer physical force subdue a disorderly member of his congregation. On one occasion, attending a dinner given by Governor Edwards, he requested the governor to "say grace," observing that the ceremony was about to be dispensed with. The wife of a Methodist brother objected to family worship; Peter Cartwright shut her outdoors and kept her there until she became convinced of her error. At Nashville, Tennessee, as he was about to begin a sermon, a distinguished-looking stranger entered the church; some one whispered to him that it was Andrew Jackson; whereupon he at once blurted out, "Who is General Jackson? If he don't get his soul converted, God will damn him as quick as he would a Guinea nigger!" Attending the general conference in New York, he astonished the hotel clerk by asking for an axe "to blaze his way" up the six flights of stairs, so that he would not get lost on the return trip. He died in 1872, after having been a member of the Methodist Church for more than seventy-one years.—J. McCan Davis.]
LINCOLN'S POSITION IN 1845 ON THE SLAVERY QUESTION.
In this campaign of 1844 the annexation of Texas was one of the most hotly discussed questions. The Whigs opposed annexation, but their ground was not radical enough to suit the growing body of Abolitionists in the country, who nominated a third candidate, James G. Birney. Lincoln was obliged to meet the arguments of the Abolitionists frequently in his campaigning. In 1845, while working for Congress, he found the abolition sentiment stronger than ever. Prominent among the leaders of the third party in the State were two brothers, Williamson and Madison Durley of Hennepin, Illinois. They were outspoken advocates of their principles, and even operated a station of the underground railroad. Lincoln knew the Durleys, and, when visiting Hennepin to speak, solicited their support. They opposed their liberty principles. When Lincoln returned to Springfield he wrote Williamson Durley a letter which has never before been published,[7] and which sets forth with admirable clearness his exact position on the slavery question at that period. It must be regarded, we think, as the most valuable document on the question which we have up to this point in Lincoln's life.