Sketches of the Rise, Progress, and Decline of Secession

Front matter

SICETCHES

OF THE

RISE, PROGRESS, AND DECLINE

Preface

I HAvE prepared this work from the single stand-point of uncompromising devotion to the American Union as established by our fathers, and unmitigated hostility to the armed rebels who are seeking its destruction. My ancestors fought in its defence; and while their blood flows in my veins I shall instinctively recoil from bartering away the glory of its past and the prophecy of its future for the stained record of that vile thing, begotten by fraud, crime, and bad ambition, christened a Southern Confederacy. I cannot exchange historic renown for disgrace, national honor for infamy, how splendid soever may be the bribe or how violent soever may be the compulsion. This is my faith as an American citizen ; and this book will show how sorely it has been put to the test. I claim, however, no merit, further than that arising from the discharge of a simple duty both of religion and patriotism.

Thousands of my fellow-citizens have been 1* 5

6 PREFACE.

equally faithful among the faithless. Their sufferings may be conceived from this narrative of my own.

Indeed, it is not from the slightest desire of self-glorification that I have spoken so freely of myself. It would have been sheer affectation of modesty to attempt by circumlocution of speech to do otherwise. For I have, in this matter, rather regarded myself as a type of the large body of loyal people in the border States, and have, accordingly, been the more unreserved, inasmuch as I felt that I might assume to some extent to speak in their behalf. It is important that our countrymen of the North should clearly understand the embarrassing position of this class, and the peculiar privations they have been compelled to undergo. It is chiefly due to them that the battle-field of the Rebellion has not been transferred to Northern homes. Their geographical location and political elements are such that, upon the soil which they inhabit, loyalty and treason have overlapped, and, being thus confronted face to face, they have been plunged into all the horrors of discord and anarchy, of divided communities and sundered households. In many

PREFACE. i respects, however, we of that region do not wholly sympathize with the North any more than with the extreme South. We deprecate alike the fanatical agitators of one section and the Disunion demagogues of the other. I believe I represent the views of multitudes of ever-true and now suffering patriots when I declare that, Southern man and slave-holder as I am, if the South in her madness and folly will force the issue upon the country, of Slavery and no Union, or a Union and no Slavery, I am for the Union, though every other institution in the country perish. Iam for sustaining this Union if it shall require “ coercion” or “ subjugation,” or, what is worse, the annihilation of the rebel population of the land. These peculiarities in my position, as an Hast-Tennesscean, it will be seen, have contributed to mould the views which I have expressed.

I am, therefore, prepared to expect that many readers will not concur in all that I have said. But I do verily believe that, as a National man,— having had an opportunity, as from an intermediate eminence, to view this question on both sides,—and having observed the bearings of the whole subject for thirty years past, I am enabled

8 PREFACE.

to suggest something worthy the consideration of my countrymen. - Hence I have not consulted the opinions of others, nor reflected whether what I say would be acceptable or unacceptable, would render the writer popular or unpopular. I seek only to utter the profound convictions of my own mind, in order that, God willing, I may be of some benefit in my day and generation, and, without fear or favor, come weal or woe, may have the sad privilege of warning my fellow-citizens, even if I may not enjoy the cheerful satisfaction of con- . vincing them.

I have suffered deeply in person and estate, have avoided no responsibility, have endured evil treatment and imprisonment, and been compelled day by day to contemplate the near prospect of all in behalf of the sacred cause I have espoused. I avouch a brutal death upon the gallows, these things as evidence of sincerity. Not only so, but they have left me m no mood for the use of softened forms of speech in narrating such acts or depicting the actors. Hence I have spoken plamly. Extreme fastidiousness of taste may, perhaps, shrink with over-sensitiveness from some of the language I have employed. But it was no

PREFACE. 9 time for dalliance with polished sentences or enticing words; for an imminent necessity—like the “burden” of the old Hebrew prophets—was upon us, and the cause of our Lorp and LAND could be best served by the sturdy rhetoric of defiance and the unanswerable logic of facts. The traitors merited a sword-thrust style, and deserved the strongest epithet I have applied. My persecution by them was such that I had a fair right to handle them roughly: they were not worth any other mode of treatment; and I have written what I have written.

I cannot close this preface without expressing my thanks for the generous reception I have met with at the North. In Cincinnati, Columbus, Chicago, Philadelphia, New York,—indeed, wherever I have gone,—I have been welcomed by individuals and by public bodies with demonstrations of honor and kindness which seem like a providential recompense for all I have endured. I shall preserve a life-long recollection of such universal and spontaneous sympathy, and leave its precious memory and memorials as an heir-loom to the latest generation of my descendants. I bear this testimony all the more willingly, because

10 PREFACE.

these courtesies vindicate me from aspersions, and are occasioned by no modification or concealment of my opinions. I have, everywhere, condemned the disorganizing propagandists of the North, and have publicly proclaimed that I was a Southerner by birth, education, and hahits; yet, when I also announced that I was a National man and uncompromisingly for the Union, I found that other things were forgotten, and that I had touched a chord which made us all of kin.

God grant that we may, as Sections, Churches, and Individuals, realize how great a share each of us has had in bringing about our present calamities, and, consequently, how much of the responsibility falls upon self as well as upon others! When this shall be felt, and when a proper spirit shall accompany the conviction, the horrors of this wicked war will be appreciated, the hand of vengeance will be stayed, and

* Returning Justice lift aloft her scale.”

W. GB.

PuinapELPHia, May, 1862.

Contents

Autobiographical Sketch—Northern and Southern Agitators alike to be Dreaded —Mutineers on board the Ship of State—South Carolina Methodists—The Right of Secession Argued—Jefferson, Madison, and Jackson all deny the Right of Secession,

Thirty-Nine Lashes and a Coat of Tar and Feathers promised me—Reply to W. L.. Yancey on the Platform in Knoxyille—Denying the Right of Secession— Pronouncing the African Slave-Irade Piracy—My Ancestors Fighting for this Country—South Carolina the Resort of Tories—Nullification in 1832—Nullification among the Ancients.

Case of Rey. Dr. Neely, the Alabama Secessionist—Praying the South not to submit to the Inauguration of Lincoln—Exhortation to Moderation.

Chapter I

AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH—NORTHERN AND SOUTHERN AGITATORS ALIKE TO BE DREADED—MUTINEERS ON BOARD THE SHIP OF STATH —SOUTH CAROLINA METHODISTS—THE RIGHT OF SECESSION ARGUED —JEFLFERSON, MADISON, AND JACKSON ALL DENY THE RIGHT OF SE- CESSION.

It is a delicate task for a modest man to perform, when he undertakes to write out a memorial of himself, and especially when he shall undertake to give both his prwate and public life. But as I have never arisen to any thing like eminence, and as it is the custom of such only as have, to write out a full history of themselves, and to give their bad as well as good deeds to the world, I will be spared the labor and mortification of any unfavorable disclosures.

It will, perhaps, be urged that both sides of a man’s picture of life should be given, and then the reader, having the whole man before him, will be the better prepared to award to him a righteous verdict. Others will insist that a man should so conduct himself as to 2 13 be wholly free from improprieties, especially if he be a raember of the Church, or wear clerical robes. To this I reply, that if the memoirs of only such as have lived and died without fault, and without incurring the displeasure of designing and bad men, were written, we should seldom, if ever, see a production of the kind.

I lay no claim whatever to imimitable excellencies ; but I do claim that my good and evil deeds, if placed in a scale, would not be so perfectly poised that neither end would preponderate! An anecdote of my life will illustrate my views of this subject.

Whilst in attendance at an Annual Conterence of the Methodist Church, in Abingdon, Virginia, some twelve years ago, I suffered from an attack of fever; and, either from the influence of medicine, or of fever on the brain, I became a little flighty. The opinion prevailed that I would die, and the venerable BisHop Capmrs, and other ministers, became anxious to know how the “eccentric Parson” felt in view of an exchange of worlds. _ Accordingly, they visited my room, and the Bishop read the Scriptures, and sang and prayed with and for me. On taking his leave of me,—holding me by the hand and looking me full in the face,—he inquired what my prospects were beyond the grave. It is said—and I have no doubt of the truth of the statement—that I returned for an answer, ‘‘ Well, Bishop, if I had my life to live over again, I could improve it in many respects, and would try to do so. However, if the books have been properly kept in the other world, there is a small balance in my favor !”

I have lived long enough in this present evil world to have enlisted the sympathies of many friends, and at the same time to have excited the bitter resentments of many foes. This affords me proof that I have not been a negative character. That a man engaged in the work of propagating Christianity, in opposing error and defending the cause of truth, and, finally, in going about endeavoring to do good, should find himself exposed to enemies, or should meet with violent and protracted opposition, may seem strange. But history and observation inform us that such has been the lot of all decided public men, in a greater or less degree. While some emblazon a man’s virtues, others will amplify his faults. A majority, however, labor

“The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide, To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame,”

rather than pursue the opposite course; and it is more than likely that on this account religious sectarians and political partisans have denied me justice. For it has ‘ certainly been my lot in life to have the shafts of unmerited censure hurled at me; and since this Great REBELLION has been inaugurated, I have been doomed to bear the base insinuations of invidious tongues and pens in Rebeldom !

Perhaps it will be asked, Who is the person that offers this volume to the world? In this the inquisitive reader shall be gratified; for short and simple are the domestic annals of the writer, though in his fifty-seventh year. I am the eldest son of JosspH A. BRowNLow, who was born and raised in Rockbridge county, Virginia, and died in Sullivan county, in East Tennessee, in 1816. My father died when I was so young that I could not have been a judge of his character; but it has been a source of consolation to me to hear him spoken of by his old associates and schoolmates (General Sam Houston among them) as a man of good sense, brave independence, and of sterling integrity. He was a private in a Tennessee company in the War of 1812. Two of his brothers were at the battle of the Horseshoe, under General JAcKSON, two others of them died naval officers, and their remains sleep in Norfolk and New Orleans.

The death of my father was a grievous aftliction to my mother, as she was left with five helpless children,—. three sons and two daughters,—four of whom are now dead, having heard of the death of the last of the four since my banishment from home! My mother’s maiden name was CATHARINE Gannaway,—a Virginian likewise, of respectable parentage, and slave-owners.

She departed this transitory life in less than three months after the death of her husband. Being naturally mild and agreeable in her temperament, she was warmly endeared to a large circle of friends and acquaintance. But their consolation was in this, that, while sinking into the cold embrace of death, she was happy in the religion of Christ.

I was born in Wythe county, Virginia, on the 29th of August, 1805. After the death of my parents, I lived with my mother’s relations, who raised me up to hard labor, until I was eighteen years old, when I removed to Abingdon, in that State, and served as a regular apprentice to the trade of a house-carpenter. I have been a laboring-man all my life long, and have acted upon the Scriptural maxim of eating my bread in the sweat of my brow. Though a Southern man in feeling and principle, I do not think it degrading to a man to labor, as do most of the Southern Disunionists. Whether East or West, North or South, I recognize the dignity of labor, and look forward to a day, not very distant, when educated labor will be the salvation of this vast country!

My education was imperfect and irregular, even in those branches taught in the common-schools of the country. I labored, after obtaining a trade, until I acquired the means of again going to school. I afterwards entered the Methodist Travelling Ministry, and travelled ten years without intermission. I availed myself of this position to study and improve my limited education, which I did in all the English branches.

I am about six feet high, and have weighed as heavy as one hundred and seventy-five pounds,—have had as fine a constitution as any man need desire. I have very

D%

18 BROWNLOW 'S EXPERILUNCES few gray hairs in my head, and, although rather hardfavored than otherwise, I will pass for a man of forty years. - I have had as strong a voice as any man in East Tennessee, where I have resided for the last thirty years, and have a family of seven children. I have been speaking all that time; and for the last twenty-five years I have edited and published a WuIc newspaper having a larger circulation than any political paper in the State, and even larger than all the papers in Hast Tennessee put together. I have taken a part in all the religious and political controversies of my day and time.

I have written several books; but the one which has had the largest run is the one entitled, ““The Iron Wheel Examined, and its False Spokes Extracted,’—being a vindication of the Methodist Church against the attacks of Rev. J. R. Graves, of Nashville. My reply was published by the Southern Methodist Publishing House, and at the earnest solicitation of the book-agents and other leading members of the Church. It is a work of great severity, but was written in reply to one of still greater severity.

In September, 1858, I was engaged in a dehate upon the Slavery question, in Philadelphia,with Rev. Apram Pryne, of New York, in which I defended the institution of Slavery as it exists in the South. The debate was published in Philadelphia, and exhibits my sentiments upon that great question, which have undergone no change since then.

Iam known throughout the length and breadth of the land as the “ Fighting Parson ;” while I may say, without incurring the charge of egotism, that no man is more peaceable, as my neighbors will testify. Always poor, and always oppressed with security debts, few men in my section and of my limited means have given away more in the course of each year. to charitable objects. I have never been arraigned in the Church for any immorality. I never played a card. I never was a profane swearer. I never drank a dram of liquor, until within a few years,—when it was taken as a medicine. I never had a cigar or chew of tobacco in my mouth. I never was in attendance at a theatre. I never attended a horse-race, and never witnessed their running, save on the fair-grounds of my own county. I never courted but one woman; and her I married,

I may be allowed to say that I have ever been, as I still am, quite a politician, though I have never been an office-seeker nor an office-holder. I began my political career in Tennessee in 1828, by espousing the cause of JoHN Quincy ADAMS as against ANDREW Jackson. The latter I regard as having been a true patriot and a sincere lover of his country. The former I admired because he was a learned statesnian, of pure moral and private character, and because I regarded him as a FEDERALIST, representing my political opinions. I have all my life long been a FEDERAL

Wuuc of the WASHINGTON AND ALEXANDER HAMILTON school. I am the advocate of a concentrated Federal Government, or of a strong central Government, able to maintain its dignity, to assert its authority, and to crush out any rebellion that may be inaugurated. I have never been a Sectional, but at all times a National man, supporting men for the Presidency and Vice-Presidency without any regard on which side of Mason -_& Dixon’s Line they were born, or resided at the time of their nomination. In a word, I am, as I ever have been, an ardent WuHic, and Cray and WEBSTER have ever been my standards of political orthodoxy. With the breaking up of old parties, I have merged every thing into the great question of the “ Union, the Constitution, and the Enforcement of the Laws.” Hence, Iam an unconditional Union man, and advocate the preservation of the Union at the expense of all other considerations.

In 1832, 1 was chosen by the Holston Annual Conference as a member of the General Conference of the Methodist Church, which was held in Philadelphia. That year I travelled a circuit in South Carolina, having appointments in the districts or counties of Pickens and Anderson, and also in Franklin county, Georgia, south of the Tugaloo River. Nullification raged in South Carolina to a fearful extent, and men of all professions took sides, either in favor of the General Government or of the South Carolina

AMONG THE REBELS. PAY

Ordinance of Disunion. Mr. CantHoun, who was an able statesman and a man of most excellent private character, resided in Anderson, and was almost, an object of worship among the Nullifiers. At least, when he took snuff, they all sneezed! The Union sentiment was very strong, but Union men were in the minority. I took a firm stand in favor of the Federal Government, and whatever influence I had was thrown into the scale against this wicked attempt of South Carolina to destroy the Government. So fierce was the opposition to me in consequence of the stand I took, that in the fall of that year I published a pamphlet vindicating myself. This was thorty years ago; and it will be refreshing to my Union friends to reproduce a few paragraphs from that defence :—

“Tt is urged against me that I have meddled in the politics of South Carolina and acted with the Union party. Nay, it has been said that I was the tool of Colonel Stoane and Major Perry. I plead guilty to the charge of having opposed the heresy of Nullification, but I deny having been the tool of any ‘man, or set of men. Deeply as I have regretted the state of things existing here, and of the breaking up of the Churches, as well as the social intercourse of families and neighbors, I do not regret having taken sides in favor of the Tariff Acts complained of, of General Jackson's proclamation against Nullifiers, and in favor of enforcing the laws of Congress. If the Tariff Acts complained of were unconstitutional,—which I do not allow,—they afford no plea for dissolving this Union. South Carolina’s remedy is at the ballot-box of the country, or in the Supreme Court of the United States, whose judges are able and, as I believe, impartial.

“South Carolina is looking to the formation of an independent Province, but will not be allowed any such privilege, as her leading men will infer from the proclamation of Old Hickory. Iam threatened with proscription and starvation, because I have dared to assert that no law has been passed by Congress, touching the Tariff, at variance with the guarantees of the Constitution and the rights and liberties of the slave-holding States. So far as I am concerned, I ask no favors of the enemies of my Government, either in South Carolina or elsewhere. I can live without you, and live among a people who are loyal, and, having the fear of God before their eyes, they will be more likely to receive and appreciate the teachings of the gospel. That there are thousands of patriotic people in South Carolina, ig true; but it is likewise true that there were more Zories here during the Revolutionary War than in all the other States put together. And that the descendants of these old Tories are now in the lead of this Nulliication Rebellion, needs no proof whatever to make the charge good. I talk plainly, for one

AMONG THE REBELS. De who is in your midst and liable to be mobbed every day; but this is the way to talk in times like these, I am not to be taught my duty by a set of gassy Union-destroyers such as constitute the staple of the South Carolina chivalry. This attempt by mob-law to nullify the laws of the General Government is but the development of a well-planned scheme for the ulterior but wicked purpose of destroying our Government. It is a wild, visionary, and supremely ridiculous scheme, and will be put down, at all hazards, by General Jackson. In fact, he has now crushed it out, and I rejoice in its overthrow, though it may starve me out and drive me from your limits. I shall fall back into Tennessee, where the people appreciate the blessings of the best Government in the world, and where the gospel is likely to produce some other effect than that of arraying the people against the legal and constituted authorities of the land.

Thus did I write and publish thirty years ago, in the teeth of the Rebellion of South Carolina! The principles I then avowed I have cherished and acted upon ever since, and will continue so to do to the end of life. Iam a Southern man by birth, raising, and education, and all my interests are there; but I am not of the number of those who believe that the South can any better preserve its rights owt of the Union than w i. If those rights have been invaded,—which I deny,—I hold it to be the bounden duty of every man in the South, as well as his highest obligation, to protect them under the forms of law and the guarantees of ‘the Constitution. These rights can never be maintained by Secession, but by a faithful observance of the Constitution and of the duties it imposes.

In October of the same year, being thirty years ago, I had a controversy with a Mr. Posry, a Calvinistic preacher, a man of talents; and in a pamphlet printed by Hrram Barry, of Knoxville, on page 9, there appears the first paragraph I ever published upon the Slavery question. I herewith give it entire, and ask the reader to examine it, and compare the principles I then advocated with those I now avow :—

“When I drove Mr. Posry to the wall, in our controversy, and convicted him of retailing all his slanders of me upon the authority of a negro slave of bad character, Bacchus, the property of his co-laborer in his dirty work, Dr. CarpDES, he came out and taunted me with the false charges that Methodist preachers were the friends of negroes and opposed to slavery, and that WxsLEy, their great idol, wrote and preached against slavery! Both of these specifications are false. Many of the Methodist preachers are opposed to slavery; but as many more of them own slaves and advocate the institution. I own none; but it is because of my poverty, and not because I am opposed

AMONG THE REBELS. DAS:

to owning them. J am but a young man, and I notice the controversy going on between the advocates of slavery and its opponents. The Methodists in New England, and other denominations, take the ground that slave-holding is a sin, an injustice, a barbarism. J do not believe them: I believe with the Constitution of my country, that slaves are a lawful species of property, and that those who feed and clothe them well, and instruct them in religion, are better friends to them than those who set them at liberty.

“So far as Mr. WESLEY is involved, he wrote and preached against the African kidnapping-business. 1 denounce that, and so do all honest men, whether they live in New England or these Middle and Western States. The American Congress has condemned it as a piracy, and slave-holding members voted to doit. I have paid some attention to this subject, young as I am, because it is one day or other to shake this Government to its very foundation. I expect to live to see that day, and not be an old man at that. The Tariff’ question now threatens the overthrow of the Government, but the Slavery question is one to be dreaded. While I shall advocate the owning of ‘men, women, and children,’ as you say our Discipline styles slaves, I shall, if I am living, when the battle comes, stand by my Government and the Union formed by our fathers, as Mr. WESLEY stood by the British Government, of which he was a loyal subject. Where will you stand, 3

Mr. Posny? Will you take sides against your own country? I shall expect you to advocate the freedom of negroes, as they seem to be the only class of beings who carry news to you!”

More recently, I held a debate in Philadelphia with Rev. Mr. Pryns, of New York, upon the Slavery question, and the five discourses are bound in one volume, in the order in which they were delivered. In my fifth and last speech, I took up the subject of a dissolution of this Union, and I concluded as follows :—

“Tn saying this, 1 am not for separating from the North, or dissolving the Union. I am willing to live and die for America as she is and has been; but America without the South, and blight, ruin, and decay come upon us, and we bid a long farewell to the last remnant of earth’s beauty, and the light of heaven !

‘Who can estimate the value of the American Union? Proud, happy, thrice-happy America! The home of the oppressed, the asylum of the emigrant! where the citizen of every clime, and the child of every creed, roam free and untrammelled as the wild winds of heaven! Baptized at the fount of Liberty in fire and blood, cold must be the heart that thrills not at the name of the American Union!

“When the Old World, with ‘all its pomp, and pride, and circumstance,’ shall be covered with oblivion,— when thrones shall have crumbled and dy nasties shall have been forgotten,—may this glorious Union, despite the mad schemes of Southern jire-eaters and Northern Abolitiomsts, stand amid regal ruin and national desolation, towering sublime, like the last mountain in the Deluge,—majestic, immutable, and magnificent!

“Tn pursuance of this, let every conservative Northern man, who loves his country and her institutions, shake off the trammels of Northern fanaticism, and swear upon the altar of his country that he will stand by her Constitution and laws. Let every Southern man shake off the trammels of diswmon and nullification, and pledge his life and his sacred honor to stand by the Constitution of his country as it 1s, the laws as enacted by Congress and interpreted by the Supreme Court. Then we shall see every heart a shield, and a drawn sword in every hand, to preserve the ark of our political safety! Then we shall see reared a fabric upon our national Constitution, which time cannot crumble, persecution shake, fanaticism disturb, nor revolution change, but which shall stand among us like some lofty and stupendous Apennine, while the earth rocks at its feet, and the thunder peals above its head !

“Contemplating our country and her Northern and Southern foes, a specimen of whom is here before us, may I not exclaim, with the poet ?—

“¢“Country! on thy sons depending, Strong in manhood, bright in bloora, Hast thou seen thy pride descending Shrouded to the unbounded tomb?

Rise! on eagle pinions soaring, Rise! like one of godlike birth, And, Jehovah’s aid imploring, Sweep the spoiler from the earth.’”

With a view still further to illustrate my views and demonstrate my consistency, I herewith submit a series f documents which appeared in the Knoxville Whig at ihe times indicated by the dates, bringing me down to the present year :—