The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No. 2, August, 1862

Yet despite the bitter need into which they have brought themselves, it does not seem that those of the South who are in earnest have lost any of their desperation, or gained a better opinion of their foes. Their journals still trumpet the loudest lies and the mass still believe that sooner or later their shattered bark will outride the battle and the storm, and float safely into the broad sea of independence. Would that they could see the North as it is, in all its comparative prosperity, with millions still left to volunteer, and with thousands of foreigners eagerly seeking for places in the fray. We have found it necessary to instruct our ministers and consuls abroad that we can not accept for the present any more of the many military officers of different nations who desire to fight for the stars and stripes. We have money in abundance, and there is no flinching at taxation—indeed, the great source of apprehension at present is an excess of 'flush times' such as is too apt to bring on a reaction. When the war broke out we had, indeed, divided counsels. The old Southern Democrats whined and yelped, and attempted 'peace-parties' and the like; but they have vanished, and traitors now confine themselves to less offensive measures, while their ranks have been woefully thinned. We may have disasters; nay, we can hardly hope to escape them. But in the present state of the war we may fairly boast of having the upper-hand. And the Northern tenacity which did not yield when misfortune lowered around, will not be likely to loose its hold now that it has learned to measure its might, man for man, with the arrogant enemy.

Under the wise and judicious policy inaugurated by President Lincoln, we see Slavery, the great cause of this trouble, in a fair way to disappear in a manner which can give offence to no one. His 'remuneration message'—the shrewdest document which ever emanated from an American Executive—shows itself, as events proceed, to be a master-stroke of genius. The longer the cotton States prolong their resistance, the more precarious does slave property become, and the more inclined are the men of the tobacco States to sell their human chattels. Already in Kentucky, Tennessee, Maryland, and Delaware, people are longing to 'realize' something on what bids fair to become altogether intangible amid the turns and tides of skirmishes and battles. Meanwhile with every day's delay Emancipation, as a predetermined necessity, gains ground among the people, and very rapidly indeed in the army. It was the lowest and most tyrannical form of an aristocracy—that of slaveholding planterdom—which caused and is still causing all this trouble, and it is beginning to work its way into the minds of the multitude that it is hardly worth while to risk every thing, and see the real criminals reïnstated after all in their privileges and possessions, when the one can only serve to continue the old sore, while the other might be better employed in free labor. And better employed, we may add, in rewarding those noble men whose lives were risked in defense of our liberties.

This consideration brings us to the very important question: How shall we reward our army, and what should be its future mission in the reconstruction which every freeman will be called to aid?

There is no use in disguising facts, shirking inevitable issues, or trying to cheat either destiny or honest labor. We have got this question of rewarding our soldiers with the property of rebels, before us, and must meet it squarely. The pro-slavery Democratic press may oppose it, as they have been doing, with all the malignity which their treasonable friendship for the South may inspire; but we have an inevitable road before us over which we must travel, and it would be well to consider it betimes, that we may tread it fairly and smoothly, and not be dragged along shrieking, by a pitiless destiny.

There are two good reasons why we should begin to consider betimes, the expediency of rewarding our army with Southern lands. The one is the necessity of a future Northern policy; the other the claim of the army to such reward.

If when this war is concluded, our Government is to have a policy or a principle, it should manifestly be that of reïnstating itself in power, in consolidating that power, and in acting as a powerful unity, according to the letter and the spirit of the Constitution. The Constitution—bear that word well in mind—the Constitution which suffers no State to usurp a single power belonging to the General Government, and which was expressly framed for the purpose of making all its freemen the citizens of one great nation. Let the reader consult the Constitution, study its unmistakable plan of national integrity and of state subordination, and then reflect whether, according to its spirit, any and every mere state privilege which may be claimed should not yield to the paramount claim of the Union?

If this war has demonstrated any thing, it has been, firstly, the fact that the South shall stay in the Union, and secondly, the folly of permitting the old Southern system to control us in politics, in social life, and in every thing. We have had enough of it. Manufactures, free labor, science, schools, the press, learning, new ideas, social reforms, the whole progress of the age, inspiring twenty millions, can no longer be cuffed and scouted in the Senate and snubbed in the salon or public meeting by the private interests of half a million of the most illiberal and ignorant conservatives in existence. Henceforth the North must rule. 'Must' is a hard nut, but Southern teeth must crack it, whether they will or no. We may shuffle and quibble, but to this it must come. Every day of the war renders it more certain. The farm must encroach on the plantation, the rural nobility give place to the higher nobility of intelligence; social culture based on mudsills must make way for the mudsills themselves—for lo! the sills which they buried are not dead timber, neither do they sleep or rot—they were fresh saplings, and with the reviving breath of spring and at the gleam of the sun of freedom, they will shoot up into brave, strong life.

Let them talk, dispute, hem and haw, that will—we can not set aside the great fact that in future our Government will be united in its policy, great in its strength, and no longer impeded by the selfish arrogance of a petty planterdom. Labor and capital are bursting their bonds—the Middle Class of North-America which Southerners and Englishmen equally revile, is becoming all-powerful and seeks to substitute business common-sense for the aristocratic policy which has hitherto guided us. It is no longer a question of radicalism, of poor against rich, of lazzaroni and royalists, but of a new element—that of labor and of intellect combined—the guiding-spirit of the North. And the question is, how to best aid this element in its progress?

The army of the United States at the present day contains within itself the best part of such free labor and intellect as is needed to reform the South. That dashing and daring energy which gladly enters on new fields, and loves bold enterprises, has streamed by scores of thousands from the farm and factory toward the camp and the battle-field. There it is doing brave service for God and for freedom. Every day sees martyrs for the holy cause drawn from the ranks of these good and noble volunteers. They die noble—ay, holy deaths, and as they die new aspirants for honor step forward to fill their places. When the war shall be over, it is to the army that we should look to revive the wasted South, to farm its exhausted plantations and employ its blacks. Is there no significance in the numerous anecdotes which reach us of Northern intellect already displaying itself in a thousand forms of restless activity? The newspaper before us states that General Shepley, in New-Orleans, has threatened that if the bakers of his conquered city do not supply bread more cheaply he will remodel their whole business and employ bakers from the army. 'Bakers from the army!' Ay, smiths, engineers, editors, and every thing else are there, amply capable of reörganizing the whole South—of tilling its fields to greater advantage, of developing its neglected resources, of making the old, desolate, lazy, dissolute Southland hum with enterprise. Let them do it.

We may as well do it betimes with a good grace, for it is very doubtful if those who venture to oppose the settlement of our soldiers in the South, will not stir up such a storm of trouble as this country never saw. An army of half a million after a year or two years of battle-life, will not calmly return to its wonted avocations, notwithstanding all that has been said to that effect. A warrant for Western lands, which will possibly bring a hundred dollars, will seem but a small matter to men who have seen unlimited paths to competence in the rich fields of the South. They will not comprehend why the enemy should be allowed to retain his possessions while they themselves have been thrown out of employment. There is to be some end to this protecting the rights and property of rebels. And it is very certain that a vast number of those who were non-combatants will perfectly agree with them.

It is pleasant to see the process of reconstruction going on so well in New-Orleans under the bayonets of our troops. But neither in New-Orleans nor elsewhere has it any vitality save under Northern direction, aided by Northern industry. The hatred of the South for the old Union is insane, terrible, and ineradicable. The real secessionists will never come back, they will never be conciliated. They will oppose Union, oppose free labor, hinder our every effort to benefit them, and be our deadly foes to the last. We might as well abandon now and forever any hope of reconstruction to be founded on reformed secessionists. A large party there is—and it will, if properly protected, become much larger—who will join the Union for the sake of preserving their property. But this party will not be increased a single man by our neglecting to punish those who have been active rebels, while on the other hand it will dwindle to nothing if left exposed to temptation and enmity. We must proceed with the utmost energy, and our only hope is in a complete reörganization of the South, by infusing into it Northern blood, life, ideas, education, and industry. And the only effective means of doing this will be to settle our army in the South. The task before us is a tremendous one, but so is the war, and we must not flinch from it.

We have come to an era of great ideas and great deeds, such as rarely overtake nations in history, and which when they do, either crush them to the dust or elevate them to the topmost pinnacle of glory. Petty expediency, timid measures, small politics, will no longer help this country. There is a great cause of evil in America—slavery—which is destined to disappear, and which will disappear whether we legislate for or against it. It is disappearing now under the influences of the war. Beyond it lies the equally great evil of Southern hatred, inertia, laziness, ignorance, and depravity. We must learn to live in the great ideas of making all this disappear before superior intelligence, industry, and humanity. The great principles of free labor, scientific reforms and culture, the enlargement of capital, the feeding and teaching the poor, should become as a deep-seated religion in our hearts, and we should live and labor to promote this great and holy faith which is in reality the practical side of Christianity—that great shield of the poor. To extend these doctrines over the whole continent is a noble mission, and one not to be balked or hindered by foolish scruples or weak pity for a pitiless foe.

He who can raise his mind to the contemplation of the government of North-America, ruling over a perfectly free continent, may see in the future such a picture of national greatness as the world never before realized. Every State attracting the eager labor of millions of emigrants—for there will be no cause in future for the foreigner to carefully shun the slave hive—the native American directing as ever the enterprises—one grand government spreading from ocean to ocean—the whole growing every year more and more united through the constant increase of industrial interests and mutual needs—this is indeed a future to look forward to. And it is no idle dream. It will be something to be an American when we count one hundred millions of united freemen.

The first step in this advance lies right before us. It will be in 'Northing' the South and in completely sweeping away, by means of free labor and free schools every trace of the foul old negro-owning arrogance. And to do this we must begin by finding or making a way to induce a large portion of the army to remain in the South and reform it. It is a grand scheme, but we live in the day of great deeds, and should not flinch from them.

It is, however, tolerably clear to him who looks to the future, that whether we boldly embrace this scheme or not, it will force itself upon us or else entail some great disaster. It is more to our interest to reward the army with Southern land-grants than it is even for theirs to accept them. The longer we bolster up in its possessions an insolent enemy, so much the longer shall we have to support an army and pay taxes. The sooner we weaken the enemy by introducing industrial rivals into his country, the better it will be for us.

If it be difficult to settle our army all over the South, let there be at least a vigorous beginning made in Texas, and other States. With Texas thoroughly colonized from the North and from Europe, sedition would be under constant check, and its boasted cotton supremacy completely held in by an unlimited rival supply of free-labor cotton. Every Southern port should be held and governed as New-Orleans is now being treated. In due time there would spring up a new generation of Southrons who would think of us as something else than cowardly, vulgar, stingy serfs, and learn that social merit is conferred not by being born on this or that piece of 'sacred' dirt, but by full development and exercise of the talents with which God has gifted us.

But to do all this there must be no flinching. This is not the time to prate of the 'unrepresented rights' of traitors, or wince at the prospect of reducing to poverty the men who have labored for years to reduce us to utter ruin!

JOHN McDONOGH THE MILLIONAIRE

In the year 1850, and for nearly forty years previous, there could be seen almost every day in the streets of New-Orleans, a very peculiar and remarkable looking old gentleman. Tall and straight as a pillar, with stern, determined features, lit up by eyes of uncommon, almost unnatural brilliancy, with his hair combed back and gathered in a sort of queue, and dressed in the fashion of half a century ago, to wit, an old blue coat, with high collar, well-brushed and patched but somewhat 'seedy' pantaloons, of like date and texture, hat somewhat more modern, but bearing unmistakable proof of long service and exposure to sun and rain; old round-toed shoes, the top-leathers of which had survived more soles than the wearer had outlived souls of his early friends and companions; a scant white vest, ruffled shirt, and voluminous white cravat, completed the costume of this singular gentleman, who, with his ancient blue silk umbrella under his arm, and his fierce eye fixed on some imaginary goal ahead, made his way through the struggling crowds which poured along the streets of New-Orleans.

The last time this strange and spectral figure was seen making its accustomed rounds was on the twenty-sixth of October, 1850. On that day, a very remarkable event occurred, which attracted the notice of passers-by and was even snatched up as an item by the ever-vigilant reporters of the daily press; this consisted simply in a notable variation from the routine and habits of the old gentleman in the long-tailed blue. He was seen to stop on Canal street, to hesitate for a few moments, and then deliberately enter an omnibus bound for the lower part of the city. Such an occurrence created quite a sensation among street-corner gossippers. There must really be some new and pressing emergency, which could produce this departure from the custom and invariable habits of forty years; so said every one who knew the old gentleman. The omnibus stopped at the court-house; the subject of these observations and his blue umbrella emerged from it, and both soon disappeared in the corridor leading to the so-called halls of justice.

That was the last that was ever seen of the strange old gentleman on the streets of New-Orleans. The evening journals of the next day contained the following obituary:

'Died this morning, the twenty-seventh of October, 1850, at McDonoghville, opposite the city of New-Orleans, after a short illness, John McDonogh, a native of Baltimore, but for forty years a resident of Louisiana.'

And the strange old man, who could not ride a few squares in the omnibus without attracting the attention of every body and exciting public curiosity to such a degree, was the millionaire, the Crœsus of the South, the largest land-owner in the United States. He had reached the advanced age of seventy, and his remarkable vigor and health had never given way under the pressure of the severest and most incessant labor. Generation upon generation had lapsed into the grave under his eye. A few, a very few shriveled old men were known to him as cotemporaries. Suddenly, while pursuing so eagerly his imaginary goal, he was seized with faintness on the street. Other men would have taken a cab, and ridden home, or at least to a physician's; but when did John McDonogh turn aside from business to relieve any weakness or want? He had an important document to file in court. It must be done that day. He is too weak to walk. There is the omnibus; the fare is only a dime; but that dime is so much taken from the poor, for John McDonogh is only an agent for the poor, so appointed and called of God. Such were the reflections that passed through his mind before he could be induced to perpetrate this serious violation of the settled rules of a life, this single blot and stain on a career of unbroken self-abnegation. With a sigh, he took his seat in the omnibus.

It was his last ride.

In a cold, desolate, dreary, brick building, constituting almost the only visible sign of the existence of the town of McDonoghville, situate on the right bank of the Mississippi, opposite to the centre of New-Orleans, and in a large room, the furniture of which was old-fashioned, worn, and time-stained, there lay on a small hard mattress the gaunt figure of the millionaire, tortured with pain and fast sinking under the ravages of that terrible disease, the Asiatic cholera. The only beings near were negroes; no white persons were ever allowed to spend the night under that roof. Those negroes were the rich man's slaves in law, but companions and friends in fact. His immense business, his vast estates were administered through them. Even his documents were copied by them. They were true to him in his moment of distress and sickness. All that their limited knowledge of medicine could suggest was done for his relief. At last, in disregard of his command, a physician was brought from the city, who pronounced his condition a very critical one. The doctor's first demand was for brandy.

'Massa, there an't bin no brandy in this house for twenty years,' was the reply of an old, gray-headed domestic.

A servant was dispatched to the nearest grocery; but it proved to be too late. The dying man perceived his condition, and requested that his lawyer should be sent for. In an hour that gentleman arrived. He was just in time.

'Roselins,' he said, addressing one of the most eminent of the lawyers of the New-Orleans bar, as he held his hand, 'You see I am going; you see I am not afraid to die. Take care of the estate; 'tis not mine,'tis God's and the poor's.' And thus, without a struggle, the soul of John McDonogh passed to its Maker.

His death was truly a desolate one. No devoted relatives or friends gathered around his couch to cheer his last moments with those tender tokens of love and sorrow which so sweeten the otherwise bitter cup of death. No soft hand of woman smoothed his pillow or relieved the agony of pain and suffering by the timely opiate or emollient. No weeping little ones were there to cheer his heart with the assurance that on their dear pledges of affection his name and virtues will live after him. His lawyer, physician, and his servants were the only witnesses to the mortal agony of one who could have commanded troops of devoted friends, and who possessed the qualities which might have adorned the domestic and social circle.

So departed this life the rich and eccentric possessor of acres sufficient to have made a duchy or a kingdom, and of money adequate to the maintenance of the dignity and power of such a position.

But if his death and funeral were attended by so few witnesses, an occasion quickly followed which was honored by the presence of a large, eager, curious crowd. It was when his will was probated and read in court. Intense was the curiosity of the public to know what disposition the eccentric old man had made of his enormous property. This feeling was soon gratified. The will was produced. It was a curious document, written on stout foolscap by the testator himself, in a remarkably neat, clear hand, with the lines as close as type, and his autograph signed to every page. Being an holographic will, under the law of Louisiana it required no witness. Ever since 1838, this will had lain among certain old papers of the deceased; and yet, during all this time, it had been 'the thought by day and dream by night' of the devoted old millionaire. In its preparation, he had consulted the most eminent lawyers and studied the most approved law-books bearing on his grand scheme. Truly, a curious, bold, and gigantic scheme it was. But let us to the will. In a slow, solemn and impressive tone, the judge proceeded to read to an eager and interested multitude this remarkable testament.

After setting forth, in the usual form, his nativity, his present residence, his belief in God and in the uncertainty of life, and that he has no heirs living in the ascending or descending line, and directing an inventory of his property to be taken immediately after his death, he proceeds to bequeath to the children of his sister, a widow lady in Baltimore, a ten-acre lot in Baltimore, the usufruct to remain in the widow, with six thousand dollars in cash. He then emancipates his old servants, ten in number, whom he designates. The rest of his slaves he provides shall be sent to Liberia. Certain of them are to be sent after serving those who shall succeed to his estate for fifteen years. The slaves to be sent to Liberia are to be supplied with plows, hoes, spades, axes, clothing, garden-seeds, etc.; also with letters of recommendation to the colonists, and with a copy for each of the volume of the Holy Gospel of the Old and New Testament, as the most precious of all the gifts we have it in our power to give or they to receive. The will then proceeds to provide:

'And for the more general diffusion of knowledge and consequent well-being of mankind, convinced as I am that I can make no disposition of those worldly goods which the Most High has been pleased so bountifully to place under my stewardship, that will be so pleasing to him as that by means of which the poor will be instructed in wisdom and led into the path of virtue and holiness.'

He gives all the residue of his estate to the corporations of New-Orleans and Baltimore, in equal proportions of one half to each, for the several intents and purposes set forth, and especially for the establishment of Free Schools for all classes and castes of color, wherein they shall all be instructed in the knowledge of the Lord and in reading, writing, arithmetic, history, geography, etc., provided that the Bible shall be used as one of the class-books, and singing taught as an art.

And now comes the ingenious scheme which had engaged the constant thought and study of the testator for forty years, by which the grand passion of his soul for accumulation might survive the dissolution of his mortal frame and still direct and control the acquisitions of his life. Of his real estate, no part is ever to be sold; but it is all to be let out on leases, never to exceed twenty-five years, to be improved by the tenants or lessees. At the expiration of those leases, the property is to revert, free of cost, to his estate, to be thereafter rented out by the month or year. All his personal property is to be sold and converted into real estate, the aggregate of which is styled his general estate, which is 'to constitute' a permanent fund on interest, as it were, namely, a real estate, affording rents, no part of which fund (of the principal) shall ever be touched, divided, sold, or alienated, but shall forever remain together as one 'estate.'