Reminiscences of Parmenas Taylor Turnley, from the cradle to three-score and ten; by himself, from diaries kept from early boyhood. With a brief glance backward three hundred and fifty years at progenitors and ancestral lineage

Introduction

THERE seems to be in the human heart instinctive desire to preserve one's race and name coeval with man's advent on earth, and is shared alike by the barbarian and the civilized! Ambition animates a large portion ; while hope, we may suppose, lingers in the minds of the remainder! Things real as well as imaginary flash up to the mind as possibilities ; and we travel on with mind and hopes sustained and accelerated by — what may be — and too often fail to utilize what is, and what has been! It is said there is nothing new under the sun? This must mean that wdiat is has been before and shall recur in the future? The desire and ambition to excel others in the race of earthly existence, and to stand pre-eminent is, and always will be, the potent force to move men to great action ; and this too, quite regardless of any moral phase of means to an end! Success alone really succeeds! and absolute, visible, tangible force is the Archimedean lever that conquers, and at the same time becomes the corner-stone of all kinds of human government, since the world began! Therefore it is that the art of destroying life by war opens the widest field for success, and the creating of heroes ; and will always be the chief factor in founding and controlling human governments!

Mankind are worshipers of idols ;the more enlightened preferring the man hero, rather than the dumb stock and stone! It is war that creates heroes! therefore the masses crave war! A few people here and there, at different epochs and periods, in senrimental moods of despondency, or of occasional religious fervor, may decry the strong arm of the sword, and advocate tribunes of arbitration; but such advocacy will never prevail ; and such peaceful tribune will ever be the iridescent dream of the imagination! No human government was ever established, save by absolute physical force — nor one ever maintained except by the exercise of that force. We, of these United States, never tire of boasting of our uii-warlike popular government, forgetting for a moment that our boasted government was created in blood and slaughter ; and that it has been maintained in deeper seas of bloodshed, and loss of life and destruction of material wealth, than all other nations of the earth have expended during our century of existencel The period is rapidly approaching when military force, on a colossal scale, will be invoked to determine and settle the disputes between conteiuling political parties and factions in our government ; and to suppress the corru}iting elements and rottenness now fast accumulating! The power of concentrated wealth must and will rule nations and peoples, in the future as in the past! To this end the heterogeneous masses of the American Hepublic, gathered from all parts of the earth and called the populace, who are tickled, for the time being, with the appellation of sovereigns ; and exercising for a brief period the shadowy fiction, called vox popnli — which in turn is the basis for that other fiction, ]^oico of God — will be set aside and kept in bounds by the strong arm of power, while superiors will maintain human government commensurate with the intelligence of the superior elements!

The scramble for spoils of office is a barrier to good government by the populace. Equally erroneous is another feature of our American Republic, Avhich is the boasted contention that State and Church are separate and distinct, and shall be kept so — that politics and religion have notliing in common! This is not true ; never was, and never will be! No government formed by men since the world began was based on any other foundation than some kind of religion! The most savage and barbarous tribes on earth have no conception of government, save as a religion! Equally so, do all higher civilizations merge, finally, its aims, efforts and motives, in the religious sentiment dominant among them. The weaker sects will be subdued, and the one stronger prevail! Every political party works under the ins])iration of a religion — and all so-called political campaigns in a popular government are in fact religious contentions — and religious campaigns! Even as I write this Introduction, and the autumn leaves are falling silently on my grjissy lawn, Harrison and Cleveland are before the people for the presidency ; both ])arties being managed and commanded by political rehgionists, with a deep and pious fervor in the heart of every leader, determined to down his opponent.

The moral turpitude of motive lias no place in the action. One party's religion is its politics, while the other party's politics is its religion ; and in both parties, the incentive is a craving for power and the spoils of office as the chief object of government! The republican's political religion forces him to detest and abhor the democrat's religion, and vice versa! I am aware some will call this merely political differences ; but, as I liave said, it is religious differences, all the same— and these contentions must of necessity terminate in armed conflict, the same as have been since human government began on ear Ui. Bullets and not ballots must be the final arbiter! Religion is a sentiment eternal in the human heart, and shapes men s conduct in the establishment and control of human government. The earliest record we have of government among men is the alleged record of the alleged Moses. Whether Moses and the record were realities or mere fictions, it is of little moment, since the narrative, in the lidit of thousands of years experience and observation, demonsti-ates that absolute power will rule independent of all imaginarv moral features! Moses found no difficulty in obtaining^rders from Deity to put to death all^ other tribes and peoples who presumed to offer resistance! His example has been followed closely ever since! Even our modern Moses, Brigham Young, of Utah, held frequent council with Deity in Emigration Canon, in Salt Lake Valley, and received orders from Deity to exterminate his male enemies ; and, like the first Moses, to parcel out the virgins among his people! All this was right at the times and places ; heoiuse, power must rule on earth as Deity of infinite power rules throughout the universe. The earthly Moses, of back date, created his Deity or his God to suit his purposes; so, also, our modern Moses (Brigham Young) managed to meet a Deity or a God in Enugration Canon, in Utah, altogether in accord to his desires and plans. (How simple the thing seems when we look at it in its true light!)

Ernest Scvmouv Uuinlcv?, lDcccasc^ Buoust, IS91, in bi3 I7tb v?car of age.

• PREFACE.

WHEN only a stripling boy, devoted to the monotonous drudgery of farm and field, the feeding and care of hogs and cattle, I was much given to carving my name and the date on the bark of large beech trees (very numerous on the premises), with my cheap Barlow knife ; and from that I went further and appropriated a half filled business journal (no longer used) to the use of recording incidenis, events and happenings, personal to myself. For what purpose I did this, I could hardly have explained, but no doubt it was largely from curiosity. I continued this pi'actice, of recording personal items, as I grew in years and observation, and when twenty years of age I was tempted to review the same and to eliminate the three-fourths of juvenile surplusage and arrange in proper order the remaining fourth of the more salient incidents in a connected manuscript for my amusement and better information. This work I did at spare hours, extending through several years, and the effect was to lead me to keeping an improved diary for the future. Finally, when genius and skill produced the type-printing machine, I proved my appreciation of the invention by contributing many dollars to various and sundry estimable young women who had mastered the art of using it, by which means I had put into type print the accumulated entries culled from numerous diaries, of all kinds and sizes, from the pocket memoranda to the quarto, and the same is piled upon my dusty bookshelves in what I call my den, where I write and think and smoke my cherished cob-pipe !

Not until a year or two ago did it enter my mind to do more than leave this manuscript for my children's disposition. My only son, Ernest Seymour, when home from college during the Christmas holidays, 1890, read over some of the type manuscript, became greatly interested in the narrative, and then said, "I do wish you would have this printed in a book/' When he returned for the summer vacation, June, 1891, he repeated his desire for the book, adding, " We cannot all have and use this single manuscript." The boy's point was well taken. I thought the matter over and told him I would do as he requested, and would probably have the book ready about the time he would finish college, say, daring tiie World's Fair in Chicago, May, 1893. This was early in July, 1891. Little did he or I, then dream of what was to come to us both in a few short weeks. He went to bed Friday night, August 14th with a high fever, which soon developed into malignant typlioid, of Avhich he breathed his last in his father's arms at 1:20 p. m. Monday, August 24th, 1891, m his 17th year of age. (See Appendix Xo. 1.) This sudden ending of his young life gave him rest. It may be he is the gainer ! Tsot so with me. However, I have tried to reconcile my mind to the inevitable, and as a loving reminder of the erst-while robust, vigorous and most genial and promising boy, 1 heieby carry out the promise I made him, and in memory of my dear deceased son, I print the manuscript in book form, only for personal friends and family. There is little in it of much interest to any others than my immediate family, my relatives, college nuites and personal friends; although many otliers may find food for reflection, and possiby discover some Avords of interest touciiing personal traits of character of some who are mentioned or alluded to in the following pages, but always with feelings of friendship and presented in a true garb. Tlie reader may smile at an occasional pessimistic utterance, as possibly meant for a joke or a bit of extravagance, but will also remember that many a truth is spoken as if in jest!

As I write these last finishing lines, I am sitting in the tower attic of my Hormazo* at Highland Park, elevated more than a hundred feet above the turbulent waters of Lake Michigan, close to the unceasing roar and noise of the rolling breakers pitching over each other, as if in haste to strike the shore, all in full view from my windows ; the blue waters dazzling in the clear sunlight of a lovely November day. Nature could scarce present a more charming view, than meets my eyes at this moment ; but still there ever comes to my mind, the sad and unanswerable question, " Why should my son of 16 in the bloom and vigor of youth, sink to death in arms three score and ten? Why not [have exj)ired in Jn's arms? Is it possible he accomplished his work at 16, while I am still behind with mine past 70?"

Parmenas Taylor Turnley.

Highland Park, November, 1802.

* "Hormazo "—Lawn and garden.

Chapter 1

The following pages of reminiscences, from diaries of some of the ups and downs of a long, and rugged, but by no means eventful, life is hardly a biography, or autobiography, but merely a rapid, personal narrative of commonplace events and wanderings of one who is without fame, fortune or many friends.

True, I have labored in fields of hazard, glory and success with many who did win fame and fortune, and who have been gazetted to the world as the greatest, of our Nation's era, while I— the quiet plodder and unambitious— enjoy my reward in having helped others to greatness. For, if I had not, at the opportune time, on many occasions, interposed my aid, some of the stars of record might not have shown so brightly. Some of them possibly not at all.

While a cadet at West Point, and since that time, some things occurred which might have been different, and some persons most interested, but not most deserving — possibly — were yet the most fortunate in acquiring fame, through timely aid from others, on whom they had no claims.

Had I not on the cold December night (25th, 1843), assisted by one other cadet, helped Cadet Ulysses S. Grant to reach his room in the barracks— through deep snow returning from "Benny Haven's" with tobacco and a little whisky, of which he had swal' lowed too much to help himself — perhaps his career mio'ht have been different to what it was, for he most certainly would have been caught and dismissed from the military academy I

Had 1 not personally and alone, at great hazard to myseil', rescued Cadets S. D. Sturgis and E. A. Biirnside, at midnight, January 10, 1840, from the snowdrift on the hill side near the cadets' hospital — too drunk to help themselves — and certain of dismissal if discovered — (and discovery staring them in the face) — what might have been the change in their records?

Had I not rescued Cadet George E. Pickett from a similar conilition on the night of February 14, 1840, what might have been the result of his after-life ? And who would have made his record at Gett>'sburg?

Had I not interposed on behalf of Capt. Phil. Sheridan to save him from a court-martial which would have dismissed, if not cashiered him, for refusing, in writiuii", to obev the orders of liood old Gen. Curtis, whde in camp near Springlield, Missouri, January, 1802, where might Sheridan have landed ? And who would have made that famous ride?

But I always, through life, did \vhat 1 could for my friends above named, at the propitious monient — and also for many others who gained distinction. But. as all is well that ends well, I have only to say, God bless their souls, long live their names and greener grow their memories. Albeit, they, each one, owed to the writer, in spirit of friendship and comity, more than they seemed ever to think of liquidating. It may be they were buUt in a way to think mainlv about themselves, while their ureat luck was foreordained and consisted in having others to aid tliem, whose sei'vice was theirs as if by inheritance, without price, merely by the laws of luck. So mote it be, for good luck is better than a fortune earned by personal labor.

Neither can I claim fame or fortune (and so far as I have experienced) any large number of friends from ancestry. This may be because none of them were hanged, beheaded, exiled, or accused of piracy, or ever became conspicuous in outlawry or popular crimes of their day and time, which goes to show that my progenitors were a quiet, inoffensive set of do-nothings. Those of them who came to this country from England belonged to that pitiable, and to me uninteresting, class called " poor, but honest." Whatever the Sunday-school books may say, close observations of a long life inclines me to think that few men, the world over, who gained fame fortune and renown, considered poverty any great reward for the double virtue of honesty. Having myself most prized the latter, I am content therewith, and have no longings for fame ur fortune.

However, it seems to me germane to my subject and not derogatory to ancestral memory, while instructive to kinsfolk, to sav a few words concernino: the lineaire from which I sprouted, and then, like Topxey, ^\jest gro'wedy

The Turnleys were a family in England, of note and standing, as far back as Queen Bess. Prior to 1550, m}'- far back progenitors are recorded as a family with a Coat-of-Arins, in the i-egister's office in London ; and while such pagan and idolatrous trappings add nothing to character, yet it tickles the vanity of some people ; and some of my now poverty-stricken kinsfolk scattered over the earth may some day possess themselves of

13 reminiscelNTCEs from diary.

other people's earnitigs and become so rich in worldly trash as to want to revel (in imagination at least) in the dreamy past and borrow prestige from ancestral stars? Besides, we are advancing rapidiv in this line as a nation and making annually a few thousand plutocrats, millionaires and nabobs in our Republic, by special laws requiring the masses to contribute a constantly increasing stream of tribute to a favored few, who will ere long be the rulers of the country, and will then desire and boast of those pagan relics called " Coats-of- Arms." Lightning of this color may strike some of my kith and kin, and they will then prize highly such badges, and m}^ departed spirit may receive a credit in the distant future which my ashes may not respond to or appreciate.

However, when the Herald College was burned in London, with scores of other records, coats and blazonry, the Turnle}^ Coat-of-Arms was destroyed. Those who were especially interested in such things had their records restored ; but the Turnle3's neglected this for many years. This is a further evidence that the Turnleys had deteriorated and lacked sagacity and jyromptness to follow lines that led to greatness.

This restoration of record was finally made, however, and the record will be found in Randal Holmes' Academy of Armory, published during the reign of Charles IL The '■^ Turn Cup Lil^'' as the arms represent, page 480, Yol. 1, of Fairbairn's Crests of Great l^ritain and Ireland.

EXTilACTS FROM THE RKCORDS IN THE HERALD's OFFICE.

" An Academy of Armory, a storehouse of armory and blazonrv, containing all things worn in Coats of

{Turnlc^,

Arms, both foreign and domestic, with the terms of arts used in each service, by Randal PIolmes, of the City of Chester, Gentleman Senior in Extraordinary to His Majesty Kino^ Charles II, and sometimes Deputy for the King at Arms, MDCLXXXYIII, Book II, Chap.—, Page Y4, Sec. C. V. (105). He beareth Argo Turn-cap flour ; Fliped : by florists termed Mastagon fliped."

" These are born by Turnley."

Page 140, Vol. 1, of Fairbairn's Crests of Great Britain and Ireland :

Turnley's Coat of Arms — "On a mount vert : an oak tree ppr. pendent and sinister side a shield gu charged with a cross pattee or perseveranda, pi : 75, cr: 2. Cross pi. 141." or, more clearly translated, " Turnley's Coat of Arms, first the shield and the pattee cross, Avith the crest, a green oak tree on a mound, pendent on the left side a reddened shield charged Avith a pattee cross ; that is, a cross in which the arms are very narrow at the inner^ ends and broad at the outer ends. Plate 75, Crest 2. Cross plate 141."

Richard Turnley was an ensign with the Earl of Essex, and embarked from Plymouth against Spain, which resulted in the capture of Cadiz. He was in another expedition under Essex for the protection of Ireland from threatened invasion bv Spain. Several members of the family held positions of honor and trust during that period. John and Francis and Edmund Turnley (the first two asensignsand Edmund as cornet) joined a squadron of cavalry, and when Cromwell became Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, those three participated in that memorable, but discreditable battle of Droffheda. After their discharge from the service two of them turned their faces homeward (to England) but John concluded to remain in Ireland, and settle there in business, married, had children and thus planted the name in the Emerald Isle. (Mr. John Turnley, Esquire, of Drumnasole, Glenarm, County Antrim, is one of the product of John Turnley of Ireland. He was living as late as June, 1892, about 73 years of age.) Francis and Edmund continued their return toward England, but tarried one year in Wales to see how they liked the people and the country. Francis liked it so well, (or rather liked one of the lassies so much) that he married and settled there for good. Edmund alone finally reached England and there lived and raised a family, a descendant of whom (Mr. Joseph Turnley, Esquire, of Tudor House, Burgess Hill, Sussex, near London) was lately living. Francis, of Wales, is the one accountable for the Turnley progeny in the United States.

He had a famil}'^ of sons and daughters, and after a time removed to Monmouth, England, where he died in 1690. His two elder sons he named also, John and Francis, and these two brothers are the progenitors of the Turnleys in this country. I omit notice of Edmund Turnlev's offspring, as also of another of the familv named James Turnle}^ who resided in Gloucester, England, all of whom had sons, andthe name and connection became quite usual in parts of England, Ireland and Wales. (Not to mention a few illegitimates in India and some English colonies.) I am only interested in the two sons of Francis of Wales (John and Francis) who came to the United States. Thev were born in Monmouth, England, in 16G0 and 1662, and after reaching their majority, they crossed the channel to Bristol, England, where they married and had families. In 1C02> Laving been tempted by the favorable inducements offered by William and Mary to emigrate to the colonies, they together embarked for the new country from the then port of Bristol, for Korfolk, Virginia, with their families. John, the elder, settled in or near Bedford County, and Francis in Spottsylvania Count}', Virginia. Francis' offspring I will not trace, as I come from the John of Bedford County and later of Bottetourt County. Both of these brothers, however, had sons and they followed the confusing custom of naming each of their eldest for his uncle; so that it is John and Francis continued to the extent of a serious confusion to trace them ; although now and then the names of Edmund and James come in. Francis' first son was born also in Monmouth in 1691. So also John's eldest was born in Monmouth in 1690. The two fathers died in Virginia at ripe of ages, and the two cousins took their places in the world, with limited education and less patrimon3\ This John succeeding his father in Bedford County, became of age there in 1712, married and had two children, the eldest of whom he named John, of course, and that John, born in 1737, ^vas my great (jrandfatlier. His father died when he was only nine years old, and the boy was apprenticed to a brickmaker and mason. In that day and time the unfortunate apprentice boy was worse off than a bond slave. He continued with his master till nineteen years of age, when he ran away, and concealed himself in another county till the matter blew over; but followed his well-learned trade of la3nng brick. Finally, at the age of twenty-four, he was married to Mary Handy and in 1762 his first child, and only son.

was born and named George; that George was my grandfather. This boy, George, was a well-grown fourteen year old lad when the Revolution (1776) began, and joined the Continental troops as a conductor of pack horses with supplies in parts of the country where wheeled vehicles and other means of transportation could not be had. He continued in the military service (never reaching above a private, or train-boy) till the close of the war in 1783, by which time he was of age and returned to his father's place in Bottetourt County, Virginia, penniless and ragged. His father was a poor man, owned onl}^ a small patch of land for bread and garden pu imposes, but made his living by his trade, laying brick. He had only two child I'en ; this son George and a girl named Elizabeth. George soon tired of the dull and unpr'Muising ])rospect in the old shant}- in Bottetourt County and set out on foot, to seek something moi'e inviting in the region of countrj^ along the upper tributaries of the French-Broad, the Pigeon and Holston rivers, in what is now Eastern Tennessee, bnt was at that time a territbr}' of North Carolina. He spent some time among the Indians then occupying that region, and liked it so well he returned to Virginia, and induced his father to pull up stakes and accompany him back to the French-i3road river where they drove their new stakes in 1785, in the rich lands and cane brakes, thirty miles east of where Knoxville now is. Meanwhile the sister, Elizabeth, had, about the close of the war, married in Bottetout, a Mr. George Graham, a Scotch mill-wright and excellent mechanic. Thev also followed the Turnleys to the French-Broad. Thus it was theTurnley tree was planted in that new territory.

Grandfather George cut logs and erected a snuo- cabin 15x20 feet, in the edge of the cane-brake, hewed out "puncheons" for the floor and rived out clap-boards for roof and doors, and in March, 1791, married Lottie Cunningham, of Shenandoah Counts, Virginia, but who with her mother and brother had folh^wed the Turnleys to the new country, and located a few miles from them. In that little cabin on February 27, 1792 their first child was born, named John C. f urnley, and he became lather to the man who writes these lines.

John C. grew up on the farm and in the shops at his father's till seventeen, then worked with his uncle (the aforesaid George Graham,) at the cabinet trade for tliree years, when he went to work on his own account The war with Great Britain (1812) being on hand, John C, with half a dozen others walked 120 miles to Nashville, Tenn., and volunteered as soldiers in Capt Kenaday's company which was afterward attached to the First Tennessee Regiment of Infantrv. The company descended the Cumberland and Ohio river in a flat boat to Cairo, Illinois, thence, to what was known at that time as Chickesaw Bluffs, l)ut now the city of Memphis; thence to Walnut Hills, Mississippi (now known as Vicksburg) ; from there he began his soldiering on foot under General Andrew Jackson, chief in command, through which it is unnecessary to follow him in this narrative. After his discharge he had a long tramp back to Tennessee through forest and swamp, with tesv and far-between habitations to rest at, sufl-erino- severe sickness and dangerous fever, but finally reached Knoxville and resumed his cabinet and carpenter work In 1818, he married Miss Mahala Taylor, and went to housekeeping in Dandridge, the countv seat of Jefferson. His first two children were girls, but the writer -changed the luck by coming into this world as the third, the sixth of September, 1821, in thelitttle village oottage his father had erected preparatory to his mar. riage. In 1824, he concluded to move eight miles east, on the state road, and erect wagon-making and blacksmith shops, to benefit bv the then stream of travel and "movers" seeking homes in Middle and West Tennessee, and the new States of Indiana and Illinois.

I have at greater length than I intended traced the line of the Turnleys, mainly to show my own personal starting point in this world of strife and labor. The information is of no value otherwise. Father named his new location Oak Grove because of the dense growth of white, black and red oaks, in the midst of which he built his huge log-house, two stories high, of large hewed pine logs. He had a postoffice established there (it being seven miles to the next nearest office), himself tiie postmaster, which he held for thirty seven (37) years. September 15, 1828^ having just entered m\' seventh year, little old John Farrell began his winter school in a small log-house a mile and a half distant from our home, and reached by only a foot-])ath through dense forest and thick underbrush. It was decided that I should accompany my tv/o elder sisters to that school; for which purpose I was provided with a small Webster's spelling-book and a cheap wool hat. I had to wait until October for my first pair of shoes to be made by an itinerant cobbler, who traveled from house to house and made and repaired shoes for families. M}'^ eldest sister was ten and the other eight years old, and I well remember mother's injunction for us to " go fast to and from school and never leave the foot-path on any account/"' In fact, for three chiklren so small, a mile and a half through almost impenetrable forest was hazardous to say the least. I continued goinc to that school until Christmas holidays, when the old pedagogue, Farrell, sent a line to my mother not to send me back again for I could never learn anything; that I had been the whole|term, from September to Christmas, on the one same'lesson in the spelling-book and still did not Lnow it. This surprised mother and put her on her mettle. She sent for Mr. Farrell to come, take supper and stay over night to talk the matter over. He came, but insisted I was too stupid to benefit by going to school, so I staid at home. Mother, however, did nof^give me up (in fact, mothers seldom ever give up a child), but to her many household cares and labors she added that of having me sit for an hour, forenoon and afternoon, and with her assistance and explanations learn my book. It is needless to say I made good progress. The next year another teacher opened a school onlv half the distance from us, and I attended that, but mother gave me extra instruction, at nights, at home, otherwise I would, perha]is, again have been marked as too stupid to learn. The reason of this was plain enough and ought to have commanded the attention of the "schoolmasters'' and parents, but did not. I was small of my age, and lived in mortal fear of the master, would sit quietly for hours on the hewed log bencii (m}^ little feet not reaching the floor by six inches) without a word beingspoken to me by the teacher, who was fully occupied with the forty or fifty older scholars, some grown up boys and girls.