Rejoinder to I.W. Allen's pseudo "History" of Antioch College

Introduction

Those who have read Mr. I. W. Allen's book, which claims to be a truthful "History" of Antioch College, have been looking for a reply to it or a denial of it, in some form. They have said, "If Mr. Allen's charges are not true, why do not the friends of the College refute them?" To this question there are at least four reasons, viz :

1. It was at once seen to be impossible to reply to all of Mr. Allen's false statements and colorings and cruel insinuations, without making a volume too large to secure a general perusal, and there was no one acquainted with the facts in the case, who had leisure to devote to their compilation. Our circumstances, in this respect, are widely different from those of the writer of the book. He devoted his entire time and energies, for more than a year and a quarter, to the compilation of his work and other collateral labors, having no other business, using notes which he seems to have been taking for four years before with the same sinister design, fabricating falsehoods where it was necessary to his purpose, and, in other cases, warping the truth, or putting it in false settings ; while, on the other hand, the Faculty of the College have, for the last two years, been greatly engrossed with the load of duties which have devolved upon

4 INTRODUCTION.

them, and I have devoted all my time to its redemption ; so there was no one who knew the facts in their chronological order, and in their relations to each other, who had an hour to spare.

2. There are hundreds in all sections of the country who know that Mr. Allen's course is grossly inconsistent. He had been through Ohio, New- York and New-England, representing himself as an abused and insulted man, because he was not re-appointed to his Chair. He labored with me personally, as a member of the committee appointed to employ a Faculty, to secure his re-appointment, after he knew that Mr. Mann was to be its head; and the readers of the Gospel Herald will distinctly remember that he and his friends were very indignant, because the committee refused to re-appoint him. Yet he represents Mr. Mann as the unprincipled, and ever successful manager of all the College affairs, a man who stops not a moment at falsehood and perfidy, when his own purposes are to be served. He says virtually, and in almost so many words, that Mr. Mann was so completely wanting in veracity and common honesty, that the characters of the Professors were constantly in danger, and that those who did not bow to his behests were liable to be removed on the simplest pretext and on the shortest notice. Indeed, the book abounds not only with low insinuations, intended to disparage Mr. Mann, but also with the boldest and strongest accusations against him. He also represents that the whole Faculty, except himself and Mr. Doherty, and almost the whole Board of Trustees, went over to Mr. Mann's interests, and became his tools.

Now the friends of the College have supposed that the intelligent reader would put that and that together, and ask the very pertinent question, which Mr. Allen's book

INTRODUCTION. 5

suggests, but which it entirely fails to answer, viz : If Mr. Mann is such a knave and villain as he represents him to be, and if the Faculty and the Board of Trustees were so completely under his control, that the grossest injustice was often done to himself, as he says, why did he mourn and complain and threaten, because he was not allowed to remain in the Faculty, and be abused and insulted as before? Mr. Mann had not changed. Allen knew that most of the former Faculty would be retained. Why, then, did he desire to continue in a position in which he had long been abused, and to co-operate with men who had repeatedly insulted him ? Why did he not rather hold a jubilee, that the disbanding of the Faculty, by a vote of the Trustees, enabled him to escape from the clutches of those who had long been pursuing him? His book, and his complaints, a year ago, would not look well side by side. Mr. Alien gave me to understand very distinctly, that he had the power to injure the College immensely, and that he should, most certainly, use it if he were not re-appointed to his chair. And one of Mr. Allen's most intimate and most active friends, A. L. McKinney, has expressed the opinion, that if he had been re-appointed, his book would never have been written.

3. By a committee of three prominent ministers of the Christian denomination, J. G. Reeder, 0. J. Wait, and T. M. McWhinney, men widely and favorably known for their candor and impartiality, who came to the College to examine into the causes of Mr. Allen's non-appointment, that they might defend the appointing power against his cruel charges, or expose their treachery to the Christians, he had been published to the world as guilty of falsehood, a deceiver, an unsafe companion in labor ;

6 INTRODUCTION.

so odious to those who knew him best, that four of the old Faculty chose to leave the College rather than to associate with him longer. The honor, the integrity of the gentlemen composing that committee, had never been doubted. They did not come to the College as friends of mine, but rather inclined, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, to believe that I had dealt unfairly by Mr. Allen. But such was the nature of the testimony adduced, that they were obliged to report as they did. As their report was published, the friends of the College have supposed that the statements of such a man as they represented Mr. Allen to be, would be read with great allowance.

4. The book is pervaded by such a malignant and vindictive spirit, and its pretended disclosures seem to exhibit so fully the motives of the author, that many have been entirely willing to let both pass, without the least notice. The whole plot is preposterous. The book does not even purport to be an account of a disagreement between parties, nearly equal in number; but it does pretend to make the incredible revelation, that the author, a young man, of whom the world has heard but very little, who had never exhibited any special sagacity or remarkable insight into character, had discovered that a host of men, some of whom will be remembered for their noble deeds and sterling virtues long after Mr. Allen is forgotten, and many of whom have long been, and are still leading ministers of the Christian denomination, and yet enjoying the confidence of the community — these men, I say, this young man has discovered to be so completely destitute of all moral principle, so wanting in all the elements of genuine character, that they merit the scorn and contempt of all right minded people; yet

INTRODUCTION. 7

that he preserved his immaculateness in the midst of a sea of corruption, which swallowed many older and more experienced men. Hon. Horace Mann, Rev. Drs. Bellows, and Craig, Elders Amasa Stanton, Moses Cummings, J. H. Currier, J. Maple, J. Gr. Reeder, T. M. McWhinney, 0. J. Wait, J. B. Weston, John Phillips, Eli Fay, Dr Warriner, Profs. Cary and Fessenden, Mrs. Dean, Miss Wilmarth, almost the entire Board of Trustees, and all others who stood in his way, are spoken of in most slanderous terms. Mr. Allen alone, has made the remarkable discovery that they are impostors and hypocrites.

This, in itself, is so preposterous as to be enough to destroy the credit of any man, making such a pretence. So the Editor of the Herald of Gospel Liberty viewed it, and so expressed himself in his notice of the book. So many persons of candor and intelligence have expressed themselves on taking up the book, and receiving from it their first impressions of the case.

We might here, perhaps, safely rest our cause; for when personal feelings shall die away, the young man who has insolence enough ruthlessly to assail the moral character of those who were renowned for integrity and benevolence before he was born, or to attack those who raised him from that obscurity in which his enmity would have been harmless, to a position which alone gives power to his malice, will be looked upon with universal abhorrence.

Still the friends of the College, and those whom Mr. Allen has attacked, have thought it best that I should make a brief reply, for the following reasons :

I. He has taken great pains to circulate his book, where our paper containing the reports of the committee b INTRODUCTION.

in his case, and where those whom he attacked are not known.

II. The grossest assaults on character will be believed by some, until disproved.

III. The abundant evidence now at hand, to prove the book a tissue of misrepresentation and falsehood, would soon be scattered by removals and death, when it would be much more harmful than it is now.

It is not proposed, however, to reply to the book as a whole, but simply to expose its leading designs, and answer its principal accusations, and thus to show that, as a "History," it is entirely unreliable.

With these remarks, I proceed to employ a few hours before I must leave for New-York to prosecute my work in behalf of the College, in preparing to submit to the public a few facts and considerations, and leave the reader to judge whether Mr. Allen's statements are really facts or fiction.

Eli Fay.

Allen's Title Page is False.

Mr. Ira W. Allen's so called "History of Antioch College," opens characteristically. It has two falsehoods upon its title page :

First, It assumes to be a " History of the Rise, Difficulties, and Suspension of Antioch College," when every body knows, who knows anything about it, that Antioch College has never had a suspension. From its opening in October, 1853, till now, it has been in constant operation, except during its ordinary vacations. Its property was assigned in 1857, but it never was suspended. We do not see why he should make so bare a falsehood so conspicuous, unless it is that here, as elsewhere in his book, he has mistaken himself for Antioch College.

Secondly, He calls his book "A Record of Facts!" How he could get more falsehood into so few words, it is impossible to conceive.

One would expect in such a work, something of a detail of the circumstances of the inception and early history of the Institution ; but, so far from this, two pages suffice for him to tell his whole story of the early measures in behalf of the College, its erection, the organization of its Faculty, &c, up to 1853, " when," he says,

10 HE JOINDER — ANTIOCH COLLEGE.

11 1 sailed for Europe," and a half a page more to bring it down to September, 1854, when "J arrived in New- York, direct from Europe." And this is but a specimen of the egotism of the whole work. But its egotism is a light fault in comparison with its gross and slanderous falsity.

Allen Fabricates a Report of a Conversation with Mr. Fay.

On the 7th page of his College History, he says : " Early in September, 1854, I arrived in New-York; direct from Europe, and calling on Elder Eli Fay, he took occasion to give me a brief history of the College during my absence, and I was greatly surprised to learn that troubles had already arisen. He reflected on Mr. Mann as the cause of them, represented him as opposed to prayer-meetings in the College, and Prof. Holmes as a firm advocate of them."

Now, I pronounce this paragraph an entire fabrication, so far as it pretends to be a report of any conversation which ever occurred between us. I never told Mr. Allen anything of the sort. Again, if I had made any such disclosures to Mr. Allen, would it not have been perfectly natural to allude to them in our subsequent correspondence ? Would not those expressions of surprise, found in my letters quoted by Mr. Allen — letters written in answer to his own — have been entirely unnatural ? The first extract from my letters which Mr. Allen has published, shows that he commenced the correspondence, and every one shows very clearly, that instead of being familiar with the subject of Mr. Allen's letters, they took me completely by surprise. The extracts themselves are evidence that I wrote under excitement which Mr. Allen's letters had produced.

He early commences his Secret Attacks on Mr. Mann.

The facts concerning this correspondence are as follows : Mr. Allen commenced writing to me in the winter or very early in the spring of 1855. I think I received about a dozen letters from him. They abounded with most alarming accusations against Mr. Mann, and some other members of the Faculty, and also against some of the students. Mr. Mann was accused of a conspiracy against Mr. Allen and the Christians in and out of the College, of showing the greatest partiality among the teachers and students, and of a general inal-administration of all the College affairs. I have never had so little interest in the College, as to be unmoved by such charges. I was greatly excited by Mr. Allen's letters, and replied to them in a spirited manner, and with that perfect frankness which I have tried to practice towards all men. I had the utmost confidence in Mr. Allen at that time and supposed that he was telling me the truth, and that he would be willing to stand up to his statements like a man, and help to right the wrongs of which he complained. I advised him to go to Mr. Mann with his complaints. In the very first letter of mine, which he quotes, I said to him, " Don't fear to tell Mr. Mann plainly just what you think of the whole affair, and that partiality shown to some teachers, and disrespect shown others, will result in an explosion, as it certainly will if it is not stopped. Now, sir, I desire to write to Mr. Mann myself" concerning these general charges.

He Dares not make them Openly.

But Mr. Allen replied immediately, saying, that he could accomplish nothing by meeting Mr. Mann, that Mr. Mann was a very adroit manager, and that he (Allen) would labor under great disadvantages, in demanding explanations, or seeking reconcilement. He also urged me to say nothing, whatever, to Mr. Mann of the nature of his charges, as it would at once endanger his position in the College. Still I urged upon him the necessity of meeting Mr. Mann face to face. I told him if he wished to effect a reconciliation through me, I must be allowed to present his charges against him (Mann) to Mr. Mann himself. But the manner in which he received my suggestions and advice, and, indeed, the nature of our previous correspondence touching this whole subject, and a determination already forming on my part to compel him to meet Mr. Mann, may all be inferred from another quotation which he makes from another of my letters, dated about two and a half months after the first. Mr. Allen quotes me as saying to him, " I cannot see why you should be afraid to meet Mr. Mann face to face, in defence of the right. Certainly I cannot act as mediator, if I must withhold all the facts. How can parties ever be reconciled while they seek concealment with smouldering fires in their bosoms? My only hope of a satisfactory adjudication is in the plainest and strongest statement of the facts in the case."

This is certainly a most unfortunate paragraph for Mr. Allen. Several most important facts of our previous correspondence are here unmistakably referred to : 1st, It appears very clearly that I had been urging Mr. Allen " to meet Mr. Mann face to face." 2d, It is equally as evident that Mr. Allen Lad refused. 3d, It also appears that I had expressed a desire to acquaint Mr. Mann with what Mr. Allen had presented to me as " facts." 4th, It is further evident that Mr. Allen had charged nie to " withhold all the facts." 5th, That I desired to bring things to light, as a means of reconciling parties ; and 6th, That he was seeking " concealment with smouldering fires in his bosom." Without the least warping, these " facts" stand out in my words, which Mr. Allen himself has quoted, and they very truly represent the entire character of our correspondence on that subject.

I continued urging him to meet Mr. Mann, or to allow me to acquaint him with Mr. Allen's grievances, and he continued to refuse, until, finally, my suspicions were excited, and I told him plainly that unless his refusals were withdrawn, I wished to hear no more of his complaints.

He becomes Alarmed and recalls his Letters.

In a very short time after, Mrs. Fay received a letter from him, while I was absent from home, in which he requested that all his letters to me should be returned immediat$y. His request was complied with at once. His letters were returned, but he has never returned mine. And, now, having put it out of my power to defend myself by quotations from his letters, he publishes extracts from mine, without the least allusion to his own, to which mine were simply replies. It is certainly a little surprising, that a man who has done such a deed, can introduce himself to the public as an example of purity and piety, and boast, not very modestly, of his numerous Christian virtues. As Mr. Allen has intimated that he will publish other extracts from my letters, unless I conduct myself to please him, I hereby challenge him to produce my letters and his own, side by side. But the reader may be assured that his will never be seen by the public. He would never have recalled them in hot haste, if he had not understood that by them he could be convicted of treachery and falsehood.

The following statement by Mr. Mann, corroborates what I have said of my correspondence with Mr. Allen, and, also, shows how he then conducted himself towards those whom he was bitterly accusing :

"In the spring of 1855 rumors reached me that Mr. Fay, of New-York, was ill at ease respecting the administration of the College. Thereupon I wrote him a private and friendly letter, asking him for the what and the why He replied in a letter of eleven large letter paper pages, containing a body of accusations, heavy enough to sink a ship. Each and every one of these was so utterly and maliciously false, so far outside of the possibility of being true, that I stood aghast on reading them. I looked about to see who could have been their inventor, for Mr. Fay had given me no name, nor clew to any. I could hardly allow my suspicions to fall upon any one. Not one of my colleagues had ever breathed to me a word of dissatisfaction. Mr. Allen I met every day, often several times a day ; he visited at my house; he had revealed no sign of disaffection on personal or administrative account. As, however, I could not help thinking that he must know something about Mr. Fay's informants, I called on him in a friendly way. His manner was mealy-mouthed and deprecatory. He affirmed that he had never written but two or three letters to Mr. Fay on College affairs, and said he would be willing to let me see them all. The conversation closed with a promise on his part, that he would never repeat such an act, but that if, in future, he should have any exception to take, respecting me, he would speak of it, first of all, to me in private.

Horace Mann."

Two other facts in connection with this correspondence merit attention : 1st, Mr. Mann learned that I had heard many reports prejudicial to the College, and at once wrote me, inquiring what they were, and who were his accusers. My chief regret, so far as I had anything to do with that affair, has been, and must ever be, that I gave to Mr. Mann the charges, without giving my authority, and that what was thus intended as a kindness to Mr. Allen, he has converted into an instrument of torture to Mr. Mann and the College. Had I given my authority before Mr. Allen demanded his letters, Mr. Mann would undoubtedly have demanded an examination, and Mr. Allen would have been exposed. 2d, Mr. Allen quotes me as saying that his statements to me had been " corroborated by others." Well, I supposed that I was telling the truth ; but it turns out that what I supposed to be the testimony of two or three persons, was simply the testimony of Mr. Allen himself. Prof. J. B. Weston is one of the persons to whom I referred as corroborating Mr. Allen's statements. The following letter from him, not only explains itself, but also throws light on the course which Mr. Allen was wont to pursue as a member of the Faculty. Mr. Weston says :

" In the spring of 1855, Mr. I. W. Allen was a Professor, and I was a student in Antioch College. One circumstance occurred, which he so explained at the time as to lead me to believe that Mr. Mann and another member of tbe Faculty, had done injustice to me. At his instigation, I wrote to Mr. Fay, criticising them, and asking for explanations. I soon learned, however, to my entire satisfaction, that they were innocent of the charges made by him, and my suspicions, which were thereby excited, were entirely removed, and I immediately wrote to Mr. Fay to that effect. J. B. Weston."

Here Mr. Allen appeared in his true character, as a jealous, intriguing, ambitious, mischief-making man, as he proved himself to be during his connection with the College, going among the students and neighbors, writing to persons at a distance, and throwing out his insinuations and accusations against his coadjutors, and that, too, while he seemed to be on most intimate terms with them.

Prof. Holmes was the other person who corroborated Mr. Allen's statements. The circumstances of this case will appear in another part of this book. Suffice it to say here, that Mr. Allen himself instigated Mr. Holmes's withdrawal, and then charged all the blame upon Mr. Mann, and represented to Mr. Holmes that Mr. Mann, and not himself, was the cause of it ; so, it is not wonderful, that for a time Prof. Holmes felt that Mr. Mann had done him a great wrong. But none are more satisfied now, than Mr. Holmes himself, of the false part acted by Mr. Allen at that time. He has recently said, and said truly, in allusion to the troubles which have arisen, not only in the College, but also in the Church in Yellow Springs, and in regard to the Gospel Herald, "Allen seems to me to be the cause of all these troubles, and I think he has haen from, the time of the first movement against me."

Thus, what I regarded at the time as a corroboration of Mr. Allen's statement was simply an expression of his own opinions by others into whose minds he had, by misrepresentation and intrigue, instilled them, and neither of whom has now the least confidence in him.

Before dismissing the subject of our correspondence it is proper to state that Mr. Allen's letters were often very voluminous, filling from three to five sheets of common note paper ; and, so far as my memory serves me, the College and its affairs were our only topic. It should also be stated that the reports of the dissatisfaction of the other teachers came to me from Mr. Allen, and I have every reason to believe that that too was created by himself alone.

Why Mr. Allen was not Re-appointed.

I will now call attention to the reasons why Mr. Allen was left out of the new Faculty, and also to the course which he subsequently pursued, and what followed.

At the annual meeting of the trustees of the College held in the last of June, 1857, all the College property was assigned to F. A. Palmer, Esqr., for the benefit of its creditors, and the Faculty was disbanded. Subsequently, it was decided to continue the educational department of the College, and a committee, consisting of Rev. Dr. Bellows, Hon. A. Harlan and myself, was appointed to employ a new Faculty. The committee did not see fit to re-appoint Mr. Allen, because those who knew him well and without whom it was impossible to organize the new Faculty, would no longer co-operate with him. His conduct as a member of the Faculty had been such 2 that they refused to be associated with him any longer. I called on Professors Cary and Warriner, who had been eminently successful in their respective departments, and were universally esteemed as Christian gentlemen, to learn if they would continue in their Chairs, and the following is the decision which they gave me at the time, and which at my request they have furnished to me : —

" At the end of the Collegiate year, 1856-7, having become convinced of the untrustworthiness of Ira W. Allen, we declined serving any longer upon the College Faculty if he were re-appointed. We felt unwilling to co-operate with a man who had proved faithless to his associates, and who stood in a continual attitude of hostility to the President." Geo. L. Cary,

H. A. Warriner."

" Yellow Springs, May 23rd, 1859."

Mr. Mann and Mrs. Dean likewise refused to work longer with him. They loved Antioch and were willing to work for it. But they had proved Mr. Allen to be so false, so malicious, and so dangerous withal, that they preferred to seek a new field of labor rather than to co-operate with him any longer. Professors Coburn and Waterhouse, who were members of the Faculty during the year previous to the assignment, entertained precisely the same opinions of him. Indeed he was not respected in the least, by one of his co-laborers, except Mr. Doherty, if indeed that were an exception. He was, therefore, left out of the new Faculty.

Then, after repeated and earnest efforts, by entreaty and threat, to obtain a re-appointment, but without avail, he immediately commenced that determined opposition to the College which he had threatened in case of his non-appointment, and manifested that malignity towards me which a true man never cherishes. He traveled very extensively through Ohio, New-York, and New-England, and wherever he went, the College was the object of attack, and I was accused of betraying the Christians. Indeed, he undertook to alienate the Christians from the College entirely. He tried to persuade Mr. Weston to break his promise to return to the College as Principal of the Preparatory Department. He did everything which he could to excite suspicion against myself, Mr. Mann and the College.

His Friend, Mb. Doherty, writes Editorials.

Mr. Doherty, who now defended Mr. Allen's cause as a part of his own, wrote an article under the caption, 11 Antioch College, — A Warning," and, by false representations, induced Elder James Maple to publish it as an Editorial, with slight alterations, in the Gospel Herald of August 13th, 1857.

It is painful to be obliged to say that that article abounds in falsehoods and misrepresentations. The College was most bitterly assailed, and I was represented as an " enemy to vital godliness and the Christian denomination."

On the 3rd of September following, another Editorial appeared in the Gospel Herald, headed "Antioch College and its New Faculty — Total Exclusion of the Representatives of the Christian Church"

In this article I was most bitterly denounced. The act of leaving Messrs. Allen and Doherty out of the new Faculty was pronounced "a wanton and high handed outrage, that must alienate and mortally offend every true and honest member of the Christian Church in every part of the country "

This Editorial was also written by Mr. Doherty.

These articles are printed in Mr. Allen's book [pages 79 — 82,] as written by Elder James Maple; and he frequently repeats the language they contain to damage both Mr. Maple and the College. So late as April 27, he caused to be republished in the Gospel Herald a portion of one of these articles, appending to it the name of James Maple. Both were written by Mr. Doherty. The phrase which he loves so much to quote, " the little scheming, selfish, greedy clique" — is not the language of James Maple, but of W. H. Doherty. See it reproduced almost verbatim, in Mr. D's. letter to Mr. Maple respecting the affairs of the Second Church in this place. Mr. Doherty and Mr. Allen were constantly in each other's confidence, and Mr. Allen must have known that Mr. Doherty was the real author of those Editorials ; did he not, then, every time he repeated them as the language of Elder Maple, repeat what he must know to be false ?

[A Gross Inconsistency.]

This article, as well as their previous efforts to obtain a re-appointment, shows how anxious both he and Mr. Allen were to retain their places in the Faculty. How inconsistent with their course are the accusations it contains.