The true history of the Brooklyn scandal: being a complete account of the trial of the Rev. Henry Ward Beecher, of Plymouth church, Brooklyn, upon charges preferred by Theodore Tilton, including all the original letters, documents and private correspondence, with biographies of the leading actors in the great drama

Front matter

Jhx iMmxmimx

XV KATHARI11E E. COHAN

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Preface

able to publish brief extracts from the statements and summaries of the investigation, so that the case has gone out to the public in a fragmentary and unsatisfactory manner. The people at large have not yet had the means of learning the whole case, which alone can qualify them for forming an intelligent conclusion concerning the matters at issue. There has been a demand from all parts of the country for a connected and chronologically arranged account of the Brooklyn scandal, giving its history, and presenting all the documents necessary to the forming of a fair opinion on the part of the reader.

Such a work is offered to the public in the present volume. In these pages the history of the charges against Mr. Beecher is traced from their inception down to the acquittal of Mr. Beecher by the Investigating Committee of Plymouth Church, with such comments and explanations as are necessary to a proper understanding of the matter. Every document bearing upon the case, including the statements of the principal actors in the controversy, the evidence of the principal witnesses examined by the Investigating Committee, the report of that committee, and the events that have occurred since the close of the investigation — all these are given in their proper order, together with biographies of the principal personages concerned. In short, the case is presented complete, and in such shape as will enable the reader to decide it upon its own merits. While the compiler has a very decided opinion as to the reasonable conclusion to be drawn from this case, the facts speak for themselves, and have been left to do so in the main.

THEODORE TILTON.

Contents

I.— Mrs. Woodhull's Charges 17

II.— Plymouth Church Takes Action in the Matter 32

III.— The Congregational Council 35

I

MRS. WOODHULL'S CHARGES.

In September, 1872, Mrs. Victoria Woodhull was re-elected President of the National Association of Spiritualists at Boston, and in her speech of acceptance made a bitter personal attack upon the Rev. Henry Ward Beecher. The Boston newspapers suppressed the most of her remarks. At length, after giving out several vague hints of her charges, she published them in full in her journal known as Woodhull & Claffliris Weekly, on the 2d of November, 1872. In this article, after asserting that Mr. Beecher was a believer in the most advanced doctrines of free-love and the abolition of Christian marriage, as held and advocated by herself, she asserted that Mr. Tilton had informed her that he had discovered a criminal intimacy between his wife and Mr. Beecher. The statements thus made public were given by Mrs. Woodhull in the form of a conversation between a reporter and herself. The following passages contain the substance of her story :

" It was brought up subsequently, in an intimate conversation between ber and me, by Mrs. Pauline Wright Davis, without any seeking on my part, and to my very great surprise. Mrs. Davis had been, it seems, a frequent visitor at Mr. T * * * house in Brooklyn— they having long been associated in the Woman's Rights movement — and she stood upon certain terms of intimacy in the family. Almost at the same time to which I have referred, when I was in Washington, she called,

as she told me, at Mr.

T * * * Mrs. T * * * met her at the door and burst into tears, exclaiming: ' Oh, Mrs.

Davis ! have you come to see me? For six months I have been shut up from the world, and I thought no one would ever come again to visit me.' In the interview that followed, Mrs. * * * spoke freely of a long series of intimate and so-called criminal relations on her part with a certain clergyman ; of the discovery of the facts by Mr. T * * * ; of the abuse she had Buffered from him in consequence, and of her heart-broken condition. She seemed to allude to the whole thing as to something already generally known, or known in a considerable circle, and impossible to be concealed, and attributed the long absence of Mrs.

Mrs. Victoria C. Woodhull.

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Davis from the house to her knowledge of the facts. She was, as she stated at the time, recovering from the effects of a miscarriage of a child of six months. The miscarriage was induced by the ill-treatment of Mr. T * * * in his rage at the discovery of such intimacy, and, as he believed, the great probability that she was enceinte, but not by him. Mrs. T * * * confessed to Mrs. Davis the intimacy with this clergyman, and that it had been of years standing. She also said that she loved him before she married Mr. T * * *, and that now the burden of .her sorrow was greatly augmented by the knowledge that the clergyman was untrue to her. She had not only to endure the rupture with her husband, but also the certainty that, notwithstanding his repeated assurance of his faithfulness to her, he had recently had illicit intercourse, under most extraordinary circumstances, with another person. Said Mrs. Davis : ' I came away from that house, my soul bowed down with grief at the heart-broken condition of that poor woman, and I felt that I ought not to leave Brooklyn until I had stripped the mask from that infamous, hypocritical scoundrel.'

" * * It seems that Mr. T * * *, in agony at the discovery of what he deemed his wife's perfidy and his pastor's treachery, retreated to Mrs. Stanton's residence at Tenafly, where he detailed to her the entire story. Said Mrs. Stanton : ' I never saw such a manifestation of mental agony. He raved and tore his hair, and seemed upon the very verge of insanity.' 6 Oh ! ' said he, that that damned lecherous scoundrel should have defiled my bed for ten years, and at the same time have professed to be my best friend ! Had he come like a man to me and confessed his guilt, I could perhaps have endured it, but to have him creep like a snake into my house, leaving his pollution behind him, and I so blind as not to see, and esteeming him all the while as a saint — oh ! it is too much. And when I think how for years she, upon whom I had bestowed all my heart's love, could have lied and deceived me so, I lose all faith in humanity. I do not believe there is any honor, any truth left in anybody in the world.' Mrs. Stanton continued and repeated to me the sad story, which it is unnecessary to recite, as I prefer giving it as Mr. T * * * himself told it to me, subsequently, with his own lips."

Eeporter. — "Is it possible that Mr. T * * * confided this story to you ? It seems too monstrous to be believed ! "

Mrs. Woodhull. — " He certainly did. And what is more, I am persuaded that in his most inmost mind he will not be otherwise than glad when the skeleton in his closet is revealed to the world, if thereby the abuses which lurk like vipers under the cloak of social conservatism may be exposed and the causes removed. Mr. T * * * looks deeper into the soul of things than most men, and is braver than most."

Reporter. — " How did your acquaintance with Mr. T * * * begin?"

Mrs. Woodhull. — " Upon the information received from Mrs. Davis and Mrs. Stanton I based what I said in the Weekly, and in the letters in the Times and World referring to the matter, I was nearly determined— though still not quite so — that what I, equally with those who gave me the information, believed, but for wholly other reasons, to be a most important social circumstance, should be exposed, my reasons being, as

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I have explained to you, not those of the world, and I took that method to cause inquiry and create agitation regarding it. The day that the letter appeared in the World Mr. T * * * came to my office, No. 44 Broad street, and, showing me the letter, asked : 6 Whom do you mean by that?" 'Mr. T * * *' I said, <I mean you and Mr. * * I then told him what I knew, what I thought of it, and that I felt that I had a mission to bring it to the knowledge of the world, and that I had nearly determined to do so. I said to him much else on the subject; and he said : 6 Mrs. Wood hull, you are the first person I have ever met who has dared to, or else who could, tell me the truth/ He acknowledged that the facts, as I had heard them, were true, but declared that I did not yet know the extent of the depravity of that man — meaning Rev. * * *. 6 But,' said he, 6 do not take any steps now. I have carried my heart as a stone in my breast for months, for the sake of * * *, my wife, who is broken-hearted as I am. I have had courage to endure rather than to add more to her weight of sorrow. For her sake I have allowed that rascal to go unscathed. I have curbed my feelings when every impulse urged me to throttle and strangle him. Let me take you over to my wife, and you will find her in no condition to be dragged before the public ; and I know you will have compassion on her.' And I went and saw her, and I agreed with him on the propriety of delay."

Reporter. — " Was it during this interview that Mr. T * * * explained to you all that you now know of ' the matter?"

Mrs. Woodhull. — " Oh, no. His revelations were made subsequently at sundry times, and during months of friendly intercourse, as occasion brought the subject up."

Mrs. Woodhull then resumed, saying : " Mr. T ** * first began to have suspicions of Mr. * * * on his own return from a long lecturing tour through the West. He questioned his little daughter privately, in his study, regarding what had transpired in his absence. ' The tale of iniquitous horror that was revealed to me mad,' said he, ' and I went to my wife and confronted her with the child and the damning tale she had told me. My wife did not deny the charge nor attempt any palliation. She was then enceinte ; and I felt sure that the child would not be my child. I stripped the wedding-ring from her linger. I tore the picture of Mr. * * * from my wall

MRS. ELIZABETH CADY STACTOX.

was/ he said, 1 enough to turn the heart of a stranger to stone, to say nothing of a husband and father.' It was not the fact of the intimacy alone, but, in addition to that, the terrible orgies — so he said — of which his house had been made the scene, and the boldness with which matters had been carried on in the presence of his children — 4 These things drove me

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and stamped it in pieces. Indeed, I do not know what I did not do. I only look back to it as a time too horrible to retain any exact remembrance of it. She miscarried the child and it was buried. For two weeks, night and day, I might have been found walking to and from that grave, in a state bordering on distraction. I could not realize the fact that I wTas what I wTas. I stamped the ring with which wTe had plighted our troth deep into the soil that covered the fruit of my wife's infidelity. I had friends, many and firm and good, but I could not go to them with this grief, and I suppose I should have remained silent through life had not an occasion arisen which demanded that I should seek counsel. Mr. * * * learned that I had discovered the fact, and what had transpired between my wife and myself, and when I was absent he called at my house and compelled or induced his victim to sign a statement he had prepared, declaring that so far as he, Mr. * * * was concerned, there was no truth in my charges, and that there had never been any criminal intimacy between them. Upon learning this, as I did, I felt, of course, again outraged and could endure secrecy no longer. I had one friend who was like a brother, Mr. Frank Moulton. I went to him and stated the case fully. We were both members of * * * Church. My friend took a pistol, went to Mr. * * *, and demanded the letter of Mrs. T * * * under penalty of instant death."

Mrs. Woodhull here remarked that Mr. Moulton had himself also since described to her this interview, with all the piteous and abject beseeching of Mr * * * not to be exposed to the public.

" Mr. Moulton obtained the letter," said Mrs. W., k: and told me that he had it in his safe, where he should keep it until required for further use. After this, Mr. T * * * 's house was no house for him, and he seldom slept or eat there, but frequented the house of his friend Moulton, who sympathized deeply with him. Mrs. T * * * was also absent days at a time, and, as Mr. T * * * informed me, seemed bent on destroying her life. I went, as I have said, to see her, and ^ found her indeed a wretched wreck of a woman, whose troubles were greater than she could bear. She made no secret of the facts before me. Mr. * * *'s selfish, cowardly cruelty in endeavoring to shield himself and create public opinion against Mr. T * * * added poignancy to her anxieties. She seemed indifferent as to what should become of herself, but labored under fear that murder might be done on her account.

" This was the condition of affairs at the time that Mr. T * * * came to me. I attempted to show him the true solution of the embroglio, and the folly that it was for a man like him, a representative man of the ideas of the future, to stand whining over inevitable events connected with this transition age and the social revolution of which we are in the midst. I told him that the fault and the wrong were neither in * * * nor in Mrs. T * * *, nor in himself ; but that it was in the false social institutions under which we still live, while the more advanced men and women of the world have outgrown them in spirit; and that, practically, everybody is living a false life, by professing a conformity which they do not feel and do not live, and which they can not feel and live any more than the grown boy can re-enter the clothes of his early childhood. I recalled

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to his attention splendid passages of his own rhetoric, in which he had unconsciously justified all the freedom that he was now condemning, when it came home to his own door, and endeavoring, in the spirit of a tyrant, to repress.

" Mr. T * * *'s conduct toward Mr. * * * and. toward his wife began from that time to be so magnanimous and grand — by which I mean simply just and right — so unlike that which most other men's would have been, that it stamped him, in my mind, as one of the noblest souls that lived, and one capable of playing a great role in the social revolution, which is now so rapidly progressing.

" I never could, however, induce him to stand wholly, and unreservedly, and on principle, upon the free-love platform ; and I always, therefore, feared that he might for a time vacillate or go backward. But he opened his house to Mr. * * *? saying to him, in the presence of Mrs. T * * * : c You love each other. Mr. * * *, this is a distressed woman ; if it be in your power to alleviate her condition and make her life less a burden than it now is, be yours the part to do it. You have nothing to fear from me.' From that time Mr. ***** Was, so to speak, the slave of Mr. T * * * and Mr. Moulton. He consulted them in every matter of any importance. It was at this time that Mr. T * * * introduced Mr. * * * * to me, and I met him frequently both at Mr. T * *'s and at Mr. Moulton's. We discussed the social problem freely in all its varied bearings, and I found that Mr. * * * agreed with nearly all my views upon the question."

Reporter. — " Do you mean to say that Mr. * * * disapproves of the present marriage system ? "

Mrs. Woodhull. — "I mean to say just this — that Mr. * * * * told me that marriage is the grave of love, and that he never married a couple that he did not feel condemned."

Reporter. — "What excuse did Mr. * * * give for not avowing these sentiments publicly ? "

Mrs. Woodhull. — " Oh, the moral coward's inevitable excuse — that of inexpediency. He said he was twenty years ahead of his church ; that he preached the truth just as fast as he thought his people could bear it. I said to him, 6 Then, Mr. * * *, you are defrauding your people. You confess that you do not preach the truth as you know it, while they pay for and persuade themselves you are giving them your best thought.' He replied : ' I know that our whole social system is corrupt. I know that marriage, as it exists to-day, is the curse of society. We shall never have a better state until children are begotten and bred on the scientific plan. Stirpiculture is what we need.' ' Then/ said I, ' Mr. * * *, why do you not go into your pulpit and preach that science ? ' He replied : ' If I were to do so, I should preach to empty seats. It would be the ruin of my church.' 6 Then,' said I, 'you are as big a fraud as any time-serving preacher, and I now believe you are all frauds. I gave you credit for ignorant honesty, but I find you all alike — all trying to hide, or afraid to speak the truth. A sorry pass has this Christian country come to, paying 40,000 ministers to lie to it from Sunday to Sunday, to hide from them the truth that has been given them to promulgate.' "

Reporter. — " It seems you took a good deal of pains to draw Mr. * * * out."

Mrs. Woodhull. — "I did. I thought him a man

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who would dare a good deal for the truth, and that, having lived the life he had, and entertaining the private convictions he did, I could perhaps persuade him that it was his true policy to come out and openly avow his principles, and be a thorough, consistent radical, and thus justify his life in some measure, if not wholly, to the public."

Reporter. — Was Mr. * * * aware that you knew of his relations to Mrs. T * * * ? "

Mrs. Woodhull. — " Of course he was. It was because that I knew of them that he first consented to meet me. He could never receive me until he knew that I was aware of the real character he wore under the mask of his reputation. Is it not remarkable how a little knowledge of this sort brings down the most top-lofty from the stilts on which they lift themselves above the common level ?"

Reporter. — "Do you still regard Mr. * * * as a moral coward ? "

Mrs. Woodhull. — " I have found him destitute of moral courage enough to meet this tremendous demand upon him. In minor things, I know that he has manifested courage. He could not be induced to take the bold step I demanded of him, simply for the sake of truth and righteousness. I did not entirely despair of him until about a year ago. I was then contemplating my Steinway Hall speech on Social Freedom, and prepared it in the hope of being able to persuade Mr. * * * to preside for me, and thus make a way for himself into a consistent life on the radical platform. I made my speech as soft as I conscientiously could. I toned it down in order that it might not frighten him. When it was in type, I went to his study and gave him a copy and asked him to read it carefully and give me his candid opinion concerning it. Meantime I had told Mr. T * * * and Mr. Moulton that I was going to ask Mr. * * * to preside, and they agreed to press the matter with him. I explained to them that the only safety he had was in coming out as soon as possible an advocate of social freedom, and thus palliate, if he could not completely justify, his practices by founding them at least on principle. I told them that this introduction of me would bridge the way. Both the gentlemen agreed with me in this view, and I was for a time almost sure that my desire would be accomplished. A few days before the lecture, I sent a note to Mr. * * * asking him to preside for me. This alarmed him. He went with it to Messrs. T * * * and Moulton, asking advice. They gave it in the affirmative, telling him they considered it eminently fitting that he should pursue the course indicated by me as his only safety, but it was not urged in such a way as to indicate that they had known the request was to have been made. Matters remained undecided until the day of the lecture, when I went over again to press Mr. * * * to a decision. I had then a long private interview with him, urging all the arguments I could to induce him to consent. He said he agreed perfectly with what I was to say, but that he could not stand on the platform of Steinway Hall and introduce me. He said, ' I should sink through the floor. I am a moral coward on this subject, and I know it, and I am not fit to stand by you, who go there to speak what you know to be the truth ; I should stand there a living lie.' He got upon the sofa on his knees beside me, and taking my face between his hands, while the tears streamed

SCENE IN PLYMOUTH CHURCH — MOULTON CALLS PROF. RAYMOND A LIAR.

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down his cheeks, begged me to let him off. Becoming thoroughly disgusted with what seemed to me pusillanimity, I left the room under the control of a feeling of contempt for the man, and reported to my friends what he had said. They then took me again with them and endeavored to persuade him. Mr. T * * * said to him : c * * *9 some day you have got to fall ; go and introduce this woman and win the radicals of the country, and it will break your fall/ ' Do you think/ said Mr. * * *, 6 that this thing will come out to the world ?' Mr. T * * * replied : c Nothing is more certain in earth or heaven, Mr. * * * ; and this may be your last chance to save yourself from complete ruin.'

"Mr. * * * replied: 'I can never endure such a terror. Oh ! if it must come, let me know of it twenty-four hours in advance, that I may take my own life. I cannot, cannot face this thing ! '

" Thoroughly out of all patience, I turned on my heel and said : ' Mr. * * * if I am compelled to go upon that platform alone, I shall begin by telling the audience why I am alone, and why you are not with me/ and I again left the room. I afterward learned that Mr. * * *, frightened at what I had said, promised, before parting with Mr. T * * *, that he would preside if he could bring his courage up to the terrible ordeal.

" It was four minutes of the time for me to go forward to the platform at Steinway Hall when Mr. T * * * and Mr. Moulton came into the ante-room asking for Mr. * * *. When I told them he had not come they expressed astonishment. I told them I should faithfully keep my word, let the consequences be what they might. At that moment word was sent me that there was an organized attempt to break up the meeting, and that threats were being made against my life if I dared to speak what it was understood I intended to speak. Mr. T * * * then insisted on going on the platform with me and presiding, to which I finally agreed, and that I should not at that time mention Mr. * * *."

In spite of the asterisks with which Mrs. Woodhull had so plentifully sprinkled her statement, it was known that the persons embraced in her sweeping charges were the Rev. Henry Ward Beecher, and Theodore and Mrs. Tilton. Her charges created the most profound sensation, and drew from Mr. Beecher the following card, a few days later :

To the Editor of the Brooklyn Eagle :

Sir : — In a long and active life in Brooklyn, it has rarely happened that the Eagle and myself have been in accord on questions of common concern to our fellow-citizens. I am, for this reason, compelled to acknowledge the unsolicited confidence and regard of which the columns of the Eagle of late bear testimony. I have just returned to the city to learn that application has been made to Mrs. Victoria Woodhull for letters of mine, supposed to contain information respecting certain infamous stories against me. I have no objection to have the Eagle state, in any way it deems fit, that Mrs. Woodhull, or any other person or persons, who may have letters of mine in their possession, have my cordial consent to publish them. In this connection, and at this time, I will only add that the stories and rumors which have, for some time past, been circulated about me are untrue, and I stamp them in general and in every particular as utterly untrue.

Kespectfully,

Henry Ward Beecher.

THE BROOKLYN SCANDAL.

Mr. Beecher's denial was accepted by the public as effectually disposing of Mrs. Woodhull's charges. In a matter of veracity between Mr. Beecher and Mrs. Woodhull public opinion naturally sustained the former.

The matter would probably have died a natural death had Mr. Tilton been willing that it should. In December, 1872, he revived the public interest in the scandal, which was beginning to die out, by the publication of the following letter :

No. 174 Livingston Street, ) Brooklyn, December 27, 1872. / My Complaining Friend:

Thanks for your good letter of bad advice. You say, " How easy to give the lie to the wicked story and thus end it forever ! " But stop and consider. The story is a whole library of statements — a hundred or more — and it would be strange if some of them were not correct, though I doubt if any are. To give a general denial to such an encyclopaedia of assertions would be as vague and irrelevant as to take up the Police Gazette, with its twenty-four pages of illustrations, and say, " This is a lie." So extensive a libel requires, if answered at all, a special denial of its several parts; and, furthermore, it requires, in this particular case, not only a denial of things misstated, but a truthful explanation of the things that remain unstated and in mystery. In other wTords, the false story, if met at all, should be confronted and confounded by the true one. Now, my friend, you urge me to speak ; but when the truth is a sword, God's mercy sometimes commands it sheathed. If you think I do not burn to defend my wife and little ones, you know not the fiery spirit within me. But my wife's heart is more a fountain of charity, and quenches all resentments. She says, " Let there be no suffering, save to ourselves alone," and forbids a vindication to the injury of others. From the beginning, she has stood with her hand on my lips, saying,

" Hush!" So, when you prompt me to speak for her, you countervail her more Christian mandate of silence. Moreover, alter all, the chief victim of the public displeasure is myself alone, and, so long as this is happily the case, I shall try with patience to keep my answer within my own breast, lest it shoot forth like a thunderbolt through other hearts.