The true story of the United States of America, told for young people

Front matter

The True 5t.ory

of

the

Preface

The story of the United States of America has already been told and re-told for youug Americans by competent writers, and yet there is room for another re-telling. To avoid as far as possible the dreary array of dates and the dull succession of events that may comprise the history but do not tell the story — to awaken an interest in motives as well as persons, in principles rather than in battles, in the patriotism and manliness that make a people rather than in the simply personal qualities that make the leader or the individual, is the aim of the writer of this latest " Story." The future of the Republic depends on the upbringing of the boys and girls of to-day. Any new light on the doings of the boys and girls of America's past when they grew to manhood and womanhood should be of service to the boys and girls of America's to-day and to-morrow. The hope that this volume may help as such a light has inspired its author to write as concisely and as simply as he is able the story of the great Republic's origin, development, and growth, from the far-off days of Columbus the discoverer to the nobler times of Washington the defender and Lincoln the savior of America's liberties.

E. S. B.

Boston, August, 1891.

It has seemed advisable, in view of the chain of events that have made the close of the nineteenth century notable years in the history of the Republic, to bring this " True Story of the United States " as nearly as possible to date, and thus include the stirring episode of the war with Spain. This new material is here thankfully offered to those young Americans who have, by their approval and appreciation, made this book so gratifying a success. May they live to be old Americans, proud of their native land, worthy of it and loyal to it; as it takes position far in the van, among the great nations of the twentieth century.

Boston, October, 1898.

To Miss Geraldine Brooks, daughter of the late author, has been given the task of supplying an additional chapter which carries the main facts of our country's story well onward into the twentieth century, the vast possibilities of which no one can foretell. Miss Brooks has proved her inheritance of the gift that so endeared her father to the reading world.

THE PUBLISHERS.

Boston, January, 1907.

The problems of the twentieth century, in which our country must bear an increasingly important part, have once more made it necessary to bring this work up to date, and Miss Geraldine Brooks has again demonstrated her ability to grasp and present the facts and teachings necessary to enable this book to continue its usefulness to those who are to be the intelligent, patriotic men and women of

the future.

THE PUBLISHERS.

The constant making of history, more and more bringing our country into international prominence, has again necessitated an extension of this useful book, and Miss Brooks has shown herself able to summarize the part of the United States in the great happenings the last four years in a way that maintains the accuracy and the patriotism of the entire work.

THE PUBLISHERS.

Boston, July, 1917.

Again has arisen the need of carrying on the narrative of our country, which no other book has quite so well presented to young people as does The True Story OP the United States. The successful conclusion of the Peace Conference has seemed a fitting milestone, and again has Miss Brooks shown her inherited talent.

THE PUBLISHERS.

Boston, April, 1922.

CHAPTER I. CHAPTER n

COLUMBUS THE ADMIRAL .......... I9

CHAPTER HI.

THE NAMING OF AMERICA .......... 26

CHAPTER IV.

CHAPTER V.

CHAPTER VI.

CHAPTER VII.

HOW THEY LIVED IN COLONIAL DAYS ........ 56

CHAPTER VIII.

CHAPTER IX.

CHAPTER X.

CHAPTER XI.

CHAPTER XII.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE MEN OF THE REVOLUTION I°9

CHAPTER XIV.

CHAPTER XV.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER XVI.

CHAPTER XVn.

A WRESTLE WITH THE OLD FOE .....

CHAPTER XVHI.

STATE-MAKING ........

CHAPTER XIX.

CITIZENS AND PARTIES ......

CHAPTER XX.

CHAPTER XXI.

CHAPTER XXII.

CHAPTER XXIII.

CHAPTER XXIV.

CHAPTER XXV.

AFTER AN HUNDRED YEARS .....

CHAPTER XXVI.

GROWING INTO GREATNESS ......

CHAPTER XXVII.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

CHAPTER XXIX.

TWENTIETH-CENTURY PROBLEMS ....

CHAPTER XXX.

OUR INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS ....

CHAPTER XXXI.

IN THE WORLD WAR .....

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

The Minute Men of the Revolution

Christopher 'Columbus

A dream of Cathay

The Laurentian Rocks of the Adiron

dack region " When monstrous-toed birds waded i

the Charles " .

An early American The red Americans A war chief of the Mound Builders The " canoes with wings "

The landing of Columbus The young Columbus Amerigo Vespucci De Soto .

In sight of Mexico A Conquistadore Coronado's march Sir Francis Drake Sir Walter Raleigh " Elbowing off"

James I.

Queen Elizabeth Disputing for possession Captain John Smith Powhatan Prince Charles William Penn, the Younger A palisaded fort Suspicious of Indians .

Dutch windmill in old New V ut dead I

Settlers from Holland approaching NeW

Amsterdam Cavalier and Puritan La Salle

Longing for the old home An old landmark .

Going to school in 1700 .

The whirring spinning-wheel Stopping the post-rider .

In the chimney-corner .

The clearing .

On the watch .

" I would rather be carried f

said Stuyvesant Champlain and the Iroquois In treaty with the Iroquois " A witch " . . .

A fight with pirates New York in 1690 .

One of King James' advisers In the cabin of the Mavflowe; One of the villagers A lesson in liberty .

King James II. .

In Leisler's times .

The people and the Royal governor A smuggler Guarding the port .

The right of search The hated stamps .

Preparing for " homespun " clothes

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

Unwelcome lodgers ....

A weak-kneed patriot and her sly cup of tea .......

Samuel Adams

Paul Revere's ride .....

The bridge at Concord ....

The British are coming I . . .

" It rained rebels " ....

Ethan Allen

" The rebels are fortifying Bunker Hill "

General George Washington .

A " Continental " .....

One of the French soldiers

Anthony Wayne

John Paul Jones .....

French's statue of the Minute Man

Dr. Benjamin F'ranklin ....

John Adams prophesying " the glorious Fourth "

The Liberty Bell

In Marion's camp

The Boston Boys and General Gage

Threats of resistance to taxation .

Inkstand used in signing the Constitution

Ale.\ander Hamilton ....

George Washington ....

The inauguration of President Washington ......

George Rogers Clarke ....

" Borrowing fire " in old days

" King Cotton "

The stage coach .....

Martha Washington ....

Daniel Boone

The new home in the Ohio country

Washington's home at Mount Vernon .

Training recruits for war with France

John Adams ......

Thomas Jefferson .....

Washington's tomb at Mount Vernon .

112 114

"5 118 120

The sale of Louisiana

The falling flag ....

James Madison ....

Tecumseh, chief of the Shawnees .

The battle of Tippecanoe

Andrew Jackson ....

The ruined White House

Keeping the old flag afloat

Jackson's sharpshooters at New Orleans

Ambushed in the Indian country .

The Conastoga wagon .

The mail boat on the Ohio .

An old-time Louisiana sugar mill .

James Monroe ....

Ashland, the home of Henry Clay.

Discussing the tariff in 182S .

A Western flat-boat

John Quincy Adams

De Witt Clinton ....

The railway coach of our grandfathers

When every man was his own cobbler

Washington Irving

James Fenimore Cooper

Daniel Webster ....

The traveling schoolmaster .

Andrew Jackson ....

Martin Van Buren ....

William Henry Harrison

John Tyler

Anti-renters, disguised as Indians, .11

bushing the sheriff .

James K. Polk ....

At Bnena Vista ....

Zachary Taylor ....

Millard Fillmore ....

Franklin Pierce ....

Jame.s. Buchanan ....

Dinah Morris's certificat, of freedom Among the sugar cane .

Great seal of the " Confederacy " .

•79 180 181 182

•83 184 186 187

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

Abraham Lincoln .

Seal of the United States

Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor

A Louisiana tiger .

In the enlistment office .

Charge of the Union troops at Gettysburg

The turret of the Monitor

Working for the soldiers

The birthplace of Abraham Lincol

Home again ....

Andrew Johnson .

The Capitol of the United States

Ulysses Simpson Grant .

Old French market, New Orleans

Rutherford Birchard Hayes .

The Art Gallery

Machinery Hall

Sitka, the capital of Alaska .

" The new way to India "

At the cotton loom

Ralph Waldo Emerson .

William H. Prescott

Henry W. Longfellow .

Peter Cooper

James A. Garfield .

Chester A. Arthur

Grover Qeveland .

Benjamin Harrison

The Washington Arch .

In the While City .

The Congressional Library

William McKinley

Major-General Miles

Rear-Admira! Sampson .

Rear-Admiral Dewey

Commodore Schley

Raising the Stars and Stripes in

lulu ....

Lieutenant Hobson

Ho

212 214

243 244

247 249 25' 252

257 260

Old Glory .

William H. Taft .

Theodore Roosevelt

Robert E. Peary .

Work on the Panama Canal

Colonel Goethals .

A Wright biplane in flight

Woodrow Wilson . .

An American submarine

A modern U. S. battle-ship

General John J. Pershing

Thomas A. Edison

Jeannette Rankin .

TheNC-4

Warren G. Harding .

Charles Evans Hughes

THE TRUE STORY OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

CHAPTER I.

THE NEW WORLD THAT WAS OLD.

ANY hundreds of years ago there Uved in ancient Greece a certain wise man whose name was Pythagoras. As a boy he had been brought up beside the blue JEgean Sea. He learned to observe carefully. He became a traveler and a teacher and from the closest study of all the things around him — the earth and sky, the sun and stars, the rise and fall of tides, the changes of the seasons and all the every-day happenings of this wonderful world of ours — he announced as his belief a theory that men called ridiculous but which, to-day, every boy and girl beginning the study of geography accepts without question. '' The earth," said Pythagoras to his pupils, " is spherical and inhabited all over."

That was fully twenty-five hundred years ago and yet, after nearly two thousand years had passed, a certain Italian sailor whose name was Christopher Columbus and who believed as did the old Grecian scholar, made the same statement before a council of the most learned men of Spain and was laughed to scorn. " This Italian is crazy," they said. " Why, if the earth is round the people

THE NEW WORLD THAT WAS OLD.

on the other side would be wnlking about, with their heels above

their heads; all the trees would grow upside down and the ships

must sail up hill. It is absurd.

All the world knows that the earth is flat."

But this Italian sailor was persistent ; better still, he w\as pa tient. His life had been full of adventure. From his boyhood he had been a sailor and a soldier, a fighter and a traveler in many lands and upon many seas.

He loved the study of geography ; he was an expert mapdrawer ; he had noticed much and thought more. Believing in the theory of Pythagoras, familiar to Italian scholars, that this earth was a globe, he also believed that by sailing westward he could at last reach India — or Cathay, as all the East was called.

For in those day.-*, four hundred years ago, Eastern Asia was

a new land to Western Europe. It was supposed to be the home

of wealth and luxury. From it came the gold

and spices and all the rare things that Europe

most desired but Avhich were only to be procured by long and dangerous journeys overland.

To the man who would find a sea-way to India

great honors and greater riches were sure to

come. So all adventurous minds were bent upon

discovering a new way to the East. a dream of cathay.

CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.

THE NEW WOULD THAT WAS OLD. 11

Christopher Columbus solved the problem. The surest and safest way to the East, he said, is to sail Avest. This really sounded so ridiculous that, as we have seen, men called him crazy and for a long time would have nothing to do with him or his schemes. But

OP THE ADIROXDACK REGION.

he persisted ; he gained friends ; he talked so confidently of success, 5)0 eloquently of spreading the knowledge of the Christian religion among the heathen folk of Asia, so attractively of getting, from these same heathen folk, their trade, their gold and their spice; that at last the king and queen of Spain were won over to his side.

I'i THE NEW WORLD THAT WA8 OLD.

and on the tliirrl of August, 1492, Avith three ships and one hundred and twenty men, Christopher Columbus set sail from the port of Palos in southwestern Spain and steered straight out into what people called the dreadful Sea of Darkness in search of a new way to India across the western waters. But though Columbus was right in his theories and though, by traveling westward he could at last reach India and the East something that he knew nothing of lay in his path to stop his sailing westward. What was it ?

Upon the western half of the earth's surface, stretching its ten thousand miles of length almost from pole to pole, lay a mighty continent — twin countries, each three thousand miles wide and joined by a narrow strip of land. Known now to us as North and South America this western continent contains three tenths of all the dry land on the surface of the glebe. It is nearly fifteen million square miles in extent, is four times as large as Europe, five times the size of Australia, one third larger than Africa and not quite as vast as Asia. And this Avas what stopped the way as Columbus sailed westward to the East.

But though it was a new and all unknown land to the great navigator it is the oldest land in the world. The region from the Adirondack forests northward to and beyond the St. Lawrence River, and known as the Laurentian rocks, is said by those students of the rocks, the geologists, to have been, the very first land that showed itself above the receding waters that once covered the whole globe. And all along the hills and vallej^s of North America to the south as far as the Alleghanies and the Ohio the great ice-sheet that once overspread the earth and that was driven by the advancing heat nearer and nearer to the North pole, uncovered a land so early in the histoiy of this western world that it was old when Europe and Asia were new.

This old, old land, however, is commonly called the New World. That is because it was new to the Europeans four hundred years ago. But long before their day there had been people living

THE NEW WORLD THAT WAS OLD.

within what is now the United States. Away back in what is known to geologists as the "pleistocene period" — that is the "most new" or "deposit" age — when the ice was slipping northward and dirt was being deposited on the bare rocks ; when the verdure and vegetation that make hillside and valley so beautiful to-day were just beginning to tinge the earth with green ; when the great hairy elephant bathed in the Hudson and the woolly

" \MiKN MONSTUOUS-TOED BIKDS WADED IN THK CHAKLES.

rhinoceros wallowv^d in the prairie lakes ; when the daggei'-toothed tiger prowled through the forests of Pennsylvania and the giant sloth browsed on the tree tops from Maine to Georgia ; when the curved-tusked mastodon ranged through the Carolinas and monstrous-toed birds waded in the Charles — there appeared, also, by lake-side, river and seashore a naked, low-browed, uncouth race of savages, chipping the flir^t stones of the Trenton gravel banks into knives and spear heads and disputing with the great birds and beasts whose trails and ir^icks they crossed for the very caves and holes in which they lived. These were the first Americans.

14 THE NEW WOULD THAT WAlU OLD.

The more people mix with each other, you know, the more friendly they become. In savage lands, to-day, tribes that are furious fighters against hostile tribes are linked together by some bond of family ties and held by some sort of internal government. So it was with the early Americans. As soon as they had risen above the first brutal desire for eating and sleeping, they learned the difference betwaen fighting for food and fighting for power ; they saw that the skins of the animals they killed could be wrapped about them for shelter and that a sharpened stone was a better weapon than one that was simply flung at their enemy or their game. From fighting with the beasts and with each other. they began to band together for protection ; then, those who lived in the more favored jDortions of the land grew a little more mindful of one another's Avants; they made of themselves little communities in which fishing and hunting were the chief pursuits, but where those who had the time and AN EARLY AMEiucN. incliuation began to fashion things of stone or

clay to meet their needs. Bowls and mortars, knives and arrow-heads were followed in time by bracelets and bands, vases and pipe-bowls. Still they progressed. The communities became tribes ; some of them began to build houses, to make cloth, to do something more than simply to eat and fight and sleep.

To-day all over the middle portion of the United States, from iS^ew York to Missouri, there are found great heaps of earth which wise men who have studied them say are the remains of the towns and villages, the forts and temples, the homes and trading-places of t?.e most civ-Uzed portion of the American people of two or three thousand years -<ro, and known for want of a better name under the term " mound-builders." In the far Western plains and river courses, in Arizona and New Mexico and along the banks of the

THE RED AMEEICANS.

" The men did the hunting, fishing and fighting- '

THE NEW WORLD THAT WAS OLD. ll

mighty Colorado there exist remains of great houses covering large sections or perched away up in the crevices of mighty cliffs. These were occupied in the early days by races now called, for convenience, the piceb/o or house-builders and the cliff-dwellers.

All these home-building people were, however, of the same race as the fierce and homeless savages who still hunted and slaughtered in the forests of the East or on the prairies of the West. All were Americans coming from the same " parent stock." Some of them, being brighter, more ambitious or more helpful than others, simply made the most of their opportunities and grew, even, into a rude kind of civilization.

But while these advanced, the others stood still. Here in the old American home-land was fought the fight that all the world has known — the conflict between ignorance and intelligence. The good and the bad, the workers and the drones, the wise ones and the wild ones here struggled for the mastery, a certain attempt at civilization which some had made went down in blood and conquest and so, gradually, out of the strife came those red-men of America that our ancestors, the discoverers and colonists from across the sea, found and fought with four centuries ago.

Hunters require vast tracts of land to support them in anything approaching comfort ; wars and tribal hostilities prevent rapid growth and there were, probably, never more than five or six hundred thousand of the red-men of North America living within the territory now occupied by the United States. They were of all classes, ranging from the lowest depths of savageness to the higher forms of barbarism ; some were wild and some were wise ; some were brutes and some were statesmen ; some were as low in the social scale as the tramps and roughs of to-day ; some as high (from the red-man's standpoint) as are your own fathers and mothers seen from your standpoint to-day.

The half-million red-men who owned and occupied our United States four hundred years ago, though scattered over a vast area,

THE NEW WORLD THAT WAS OLD.

] of the

"n speaking different languages and varying, according to location, in customs, costume, manners, laws and life, were still brothers, springing from the same original family and having, in whatever section of the land they lived, certain things alike ; they all had the same straight, black hair; they all used in their talk the same sort of many-syllabled words — "bunch words" as they are called; and they were all what we know as communists — that is, they held their land, their homes and their prop erty in common.

A red American's village was like one large family. All its life, all its interests and all its desires being shared jointly by all its inmates. Just as if to-day, the people of Natick, or Catskill, or Zanesville or Pasadena should agree to live together in one big house with little compartments for each family, eafcing together from the same soup-kettle and dividing all they raised and all they found equally between all the inmates of the one big house. The men did the hunting and fishing and fighting ; the women attended to the homework and the field labor. The boys and girls learned early to do their share and in the home the woman of the house was supreme. Even the greatest war-chief when once within his house dared not disobey the women of his house.

The red-men had but a dim idea of God and heaven. They were superstitious and full of fancies and imaginings. They worjhiped the winds, the thimder and the sun, and were terriblj; afraid of whatever they could not understand. They Iiad good spirits and bad — those that helped them in seed time and harvest, in woodcraft and the chase, and those, also, that baffled and annoyed them when arrows failed to strike, traps to catch or crops to grow.

COLUMBUS THE ADMIRAL.

In other words, the red-men of North America were bnt as Httle children who have not yet learned and cannot, therefore, understand the reasons and the causes of the daily happenings that make up life.

CHAPTER IT.

COLUMBUS THE ADMIRAL.

N a beautiful October morning in the year 1492, as one of the red Americans belonging to the island tribes that then lived on what we know as the Bahama group, southeast of the Florida coast, parted the heavy foliage that ran almost down to the sea on his island home of

Guauahani, he saw a sight that very nearly took his breath away.

Just what it was he could not at first make

out, but he thought either that three terrible

sea-monsters had come up from the water to

destroy his land and people or that three great

canoes with wings had dropped from the sky

bringing, perhaps, to the folks of Guanahani

some marvelous message from the spirits of

the air of whom they stood in so much awe.

Gazing upon the startling vision imtil he

had recovered from his first surprise he

wheeled about and dashed into his village to

arouse his friends and neighbors. His loud

calls quickly summoned them and out from the

forest and through the hastily parted foliage

they rushed to the water's edge. But as they the " ianoes with -wings.'

COLUMBUa THE ADMIRAL.

gained the low and level beach they too stood mute with terror and surprise. For, from each of the monster canoes, other canoes put off. In them were strange beings clothed in glittering metal or gaily colored robes. Their faces were pale in color ; their hair was curly and sunny in hue. And in the foremost canoe grasping in one hand a long pole from which streamed a gorgeous banner and with the other outstretched as if in greeting stood a figure upon whom the Americans looked with wonder, reverence and awe. It was a tall and commanding figure, noble in aspect and brilliant in costume and as the islanders marked the marvelous face and form of this scarletrclad leader they bent in reverence

and cried aloud " Tiirey ; hirey ; they are turey!'" (Heaven-sent.) On came the canoes filled with a glittering company and gay with fluttering flags. But as the first boat grounded on the beach and the tall chief in scarlet, his gray head yet luicovered, the flaming banner still clasped in his hand, leaped into the water followed by his men the terrified natives thought the spirits of the air Avere come to take vengeance upon them and, turning, they fled to the security of thicket and treetrunk. But led back by curiosity they looked again upon these strange new-comers, and behold! they were all kneeling, bareheaded, upon the sand, kissing the earth and lifting their eyes toward the skies.

Then the scarlet-mantled leader rising from the groimd, planted the gre.at standard in the sand and drawing a long and shining sword he spoke loud and solemn words in a language the wondering islanders could not understand, while those marvelous figures in glittering metal and gleaming cloth knelt about him as if in

THE LANDING OF COLUMBUS.

THE YOUNG COLUMBUS.

" It was the realisation of a life-long dream, first dimly conceived by him in , boyhood days at Genoa."

COLUMBUS THE ADMIRAL. 23

worship. They kissed their chieftain's hands, they embraced his feet and raised such loud and joyous shouts that the simple islanders puzzled yet over-awed supposed all they saw to be signs of the devoutest adoration. '■'■ Turey ; turey!'" they cried again. "He is heaven-sent." And then they, too, prostrated themselves in adoration.

Who wore these pale-faced visitors who had come in such a startling way across the eastern sea ? Not for years could the red Americans into whose lands they came understand who they were or why they had visited them, although they learned, all too soon, that there was little about the new comers that Avas godlike or heavenly. The pale-faced strangers deceived and ill-treated the simple natives from the first and for four hundred years the red-men of America have known little but bad faith and ill-treatment at the hands of the white.

But Ave who have heard the story again and again know who were these white visitors to Guanahani and from whence they came. For the leader of that brilliant throng that knelt in thankfulness upon the Bahama sand — this chieftain, whose followers clustered about him and raised applauding shouts while he took possession of the new-found land in the name and by the authority of Ferdinand and Isabella, king and queen of Spain — this scarlet-mantled captain whom the Avondering natives Avorshiped as a god, was that Christopher Columbus, the Avool-comber's son, the enthusiast whom men had laughed at as a madman and a " crank," the patient, persistent Italian adventurer Avho was now because of his great discovery oAvner of one tenth part of all the riches he should find. Lord Admiral of all the Avaters into Avhich he should sail and viceroy of all the lands of this New Spain upon Avhose sunny shores he had set foot. '• I have found Cathay," he cried.

It was a glorious ending to long years of toil and struggle. It was the realization of a life-long dream, first dimly conceived by him in his boyhood days at Genoa. With firm and unwavering

24 COLUMBUS THE ABMIBAL.

faith Columbus had overcome all odds. He had been despised and ridiculed, threatened and cast aside ; he had gone from court to court in Europe vainly seeking aid for his enterprise ; and when, at last, this was cautiously given, he had braved the terrors of an unknown sea with three crazy little vessels and an unwilling company of a hundred and twenty men. For days and days he had sailed westward seeing nothing, finding nothing, while his men sneered and grumbled and plainly showed that, if they dared, they Avould gladly have flung their captain overboard and turned about for home. At last signs of land began to appear — vagrant seaweed and floating drift wood, land birds blown off the shore and warm breezes that almost smelled of field and forest. And then, one day, at midnight the admiral saw a moving light that told of life near by and finally in the early morning the cry of Land ! from the watchful lookout, Kodrigo de Triana, a sailor on board the Nina, told that the end of the long waiting at last had come and that Cathay Avas found.

It was on the morning of Friday the twelfth of October, 1492, that Columbus landed on the island of Guanahani and solemnly named the island " San Salvador." The rich vegetation, the darkskinned natives, the rude but glittering ornaments in their ears and on their arms alike strengthened his belief that his plans were all successful and that he had found the land of gold and spices he had sailed away to seek. He had promised to find the Indies and because by sailing westward he had come upon what he supposed to be certain rich islands off the India coast these islands were called and have ever since been known as the West Indies, while the red natives who inhabited both the islands and the vast continent beyond have ever since been called by the name the Spanish discoverers gave them — Indians.