Civil War History - Secession and PoliticsWas it Slavery, or was it States Rights? Perhaps it was the election of Lincoln? What were the real reasons for Southern Secession and what were the political issues in this time of war? Find your answers here in the Secession and Politics Disussion.
I wrote Pa a few lines yesterday but thought he might not get it. I am tolerably well. We are encamped at this place which is something larger than Fishersville. It is a rather poor looking town. The Yankees had been here some time & ate pretty near everything that they could find. We manage to get pretty good fare when the boys go out in the country. They bring in a great many peaches chickens & they get them off the Yankee Farms in Fairfax. Well I have rec'd a commission at last as a 2nd Lieut so whenever I get tired of soldiering I can resign & come home which I think I shall do in a few weeks. Our company are generally well. Marshall Hanger has been loafing around here & has never joined our company. He is going home today or tomorrow. As Augusta has furnished her quota of volunteers the militia will not be needed. Our Army is camped in every direction from the Junction. Jacksons Brigade is in camp about 3/4 of a mile below Centreville which is 6 or 7 miles from the Junction. I stayed all night there with Ed Waddell. Monday night I saw John Hill. He wanted a light woolen round about & a pair pants of same quality & if you could have them made you could send them down by some of his company who have gone home on furlough. I expect their company was paid off Tuesday & John must have gotten his wages which amounted to between $20 & $40. He told that he wanted me to take his pay & send it to Pa to keep for him that he had very little use for money. Uncle Moore & Post are at Centreville. I saw Martin Yontz on Monday. He had brought a wagonload provisions down to Hamtramels Guards. He says our folks are all well. I sent word by him to Grand Pa that you are all well. I don't think there will be a battle for a good while perhaps 2 months. Yes we have about eighty-five men in our company. Lib Davis came down with me & Martin Palmer got here yesterday. There is still 2 of our boys left in Augusta Henry Miller & George Layman. Well Ma I don't believe I need anything at present. I will send this letter by Marshall Hanger or Dr Walker. Write soon. Tell Pa to write to me. Give my love to all.
With Love
Your Son
William B. Gallaher
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The indications are very strong that we shall move in a few days-perhaps tomorrow. Lest I should not be able to write again, I feel impelled to write a few lines that may fall under your eye when I am no more.
I have no misgivings about, or lack of confidence in the cause in which I am engaged, and my courage does not halt or falter. I know how strongly American Civilization now leans on the triumph of the Government, and how great a debt we owe to those who went before us through the blood and suffering of the Revolution. And I am willing-perfectly willing-to lay down all the joys in this life, to help maintain this Government, and to pay that debt.
Sarah, my love for you is deathless. It seems to bind me with mighty cables that nothing but Omnipotence could break; and yet my love of country comes over me like a strong wind and bears me irresistibly on with all these chains to the battlefield.
The memories of the blissful moments I have spent with you come creeping over me, and I feel most grateful to God and to you that I have enjoyed them for so long. How hard it is for me to give them up and burn to ashes the hopes of future years, when, God willing, we might still have lived and loved together, and seen our sons grown up to honorable manhood around us. I have, I know, but few and small claims upon Divine Providence, but something whispers to me-perhaps it is the wafted prayer of my little Edgar, that I shall return to my loved ones unharmed. If I do not my dear Sarah, never forget how much I love you, and that when my last breath escapes me on the battlefield, it will whisper your name. Forgive my many faults, and the many pains I have caused you. How thoughtless and foolish I have often times been! How gladly would I wash out with my tears every little spot upon your happiness.
But, oh Sarah! If the dead can come back to this earth and flit unseen around those they loved, I shall always be near you; in the gladdest days and in the darkest nights...always, always. And if there be a soft breeze upon your cheek, it shall be my breath, and as the cool air fans your throbbing temple, it shall be my spirit passing by. Sarah, do not mourn me dead; think I am gone and wait for me, for we shall meet again.
(Sullivan Ballou was killed a week later at the battle of Bull Run)
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MONTGOMERY WEEKLY ADVERTISER, October 8, 1862, p. 1, c. 2
"A Fair Exchange is no Robbery."
"Personne," the correspondent of the Charleston Courier, recording some incidents of the late battles on Manassas Plains, mentions the following of an Alabama boy:
It is related of a soldier belonging to the Eighth Alabama Regiment, that he found a Yankee in the woods, that being separated from his regiment he did not know what to do with him. While soliloquizing, the officer who gave me the incident rode by, and his advice being asked, he told the soldier he had better let the prisoner go. "Well" said the Alabamian, "I reckon I will; but look here, Yankee, you can't leave till you've given me some of them good clothes. Strip! I want your boots and breeches." The Yankee protested against any such indignity, and appealed to the officer to protect him. The Alabamian also plead his cause. "Here's this fellow," said he, "come down here a robbing of our people, and he's stayed so long it's no mor'n right he should pay for his board. I don't want him to go round in his bar legs any mor'n he wants to; and I mean to give him my old clothes." "A fair exchange is no robbery," replied the officer, "and as you have no shoes and a mighty poor pair of pants, I reckon you had better help yourself." "Now Yankee, you hear what the 'boss' says, do yer; off with your traps and let's trade." The last thing my friend saw as he rode away, was the two worthies in their "bar legs," stripping for an exchange.
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We all know about the Federal authorities cutting C.S. buttons off veterans' coats. But they did not restrict their pogrom on rebel uniforms and badges to those worn by the living. The dead were not beyond the reach of "the finest government on earth", as in the case of:
BROWN, William Dawson Resident of Baltimore. 1st Lieut., Chesapeake Artillery [a.k.a. 4th Md. Artillery]. Captain by June 1862. Acting chief of artillery of Ewell’s Division in December 1862. On 9th May 1863 he wrote: “We have seen much hard service since leaving the Northern Neck. Our stay there is the one bright spot in our career as a company. We did not know then what a soldier’s life was. It may please you to know that our battery has made its mark in all the battles fought from ‘Cedar Mountain’ to Fredericksburg. I am proud of my command & would not relinquish it for a regiment.” Mortally wounded & captured at Gettysburg on 3rd July 1863:- "[He] was among the first to fall, having both legs shattered, although he survived his dreadful injuries several days." A member of the battery wrote that “Our gallant Captain, William D. Brown, was the first to fall. Riding to the front of his battery, he enjoined us, for the honor of our native State, to stand manfully to our guns. The words were still upon his lips when he fell, dreadfully mangled by a solid shot. No braver or more unselfish patriot fell upon that blood-soaked field, and none were more beloved by their commands.” He died on 11th July. His obituary appeared in the Baltimore Sun on 14th July. His funeral was conducted at Greenmount Cemetery in Baltimore on 31st July. As his coffin was about to be placed in the ground, Union soldiers arrested the male members of the funeral party. “The coffin was then broken open and a new Confederate uniform in which his friends had lain him stripped from the frigid limbs of the resistless soldier.” [Ruffner, Maryland’s Blue & Gray, pp.133, 138 & 299; Goldsborough, The Maryland Line In The Confederate Army, p.324.]
Letter from George McClellan to Abraham Lincoln
Headquarters, Army of the Potomac near Harrison's Landing, Va. July 7, 1862
Mr. President
You have been fully informed, that the Rebel army is in our front, with the purpose of overwhelming us by attacking our positions or reducing us by blocking our river communications. I can not but regard our condition as critical and I earnestly desire, in view of possible contingencies, to lay before your Excellency, for your private consideration, my general views concerning the state of the rebellion; although they do not strictly relate to the situation of this Army or strictly come within the scope of my official duties. These views amount to convictions and are deeply impressed upon my mind and heart.
Our cause must never be abandoned; it is the cause of free institutions and self government. The Constitution and the Union must be preserved, whatever may be the cost in time, treasure and blood. If secession is successful, other dissolutions are clearly to be seen in the future. Let neither military disaster, political faction or foreign war shake your settled purpose to enforce the equal operation of the laws of the United States upon the people of every state.
The time has come when the Government must determine upon a civil and military policy, covering the whole ground of our national trouble. The responsibility of determining, declaring and supporting such civil and military policy and of directing the whole course of national affairs in regard to the rebellion, must now be assumed and exercised by you or our cause will be lost. The Constitution gives you power sufficient even for the present terrible exigency.
This rebellion has assumed the character of a War: as such it should be regarded; and it should be conducted upon the highest principles known to Christian Civilization. It should not be a War looking to the subjugation of the people of any state, in any event. It should not be, at all, a War upon population; but against armed forces and political organizations. Neither confiscation of property, political executions of persons, territorial organization of states or forcible abolition of slavery should be contemplated for a moment. In prosecuting the War, all private property and unarmed persons should be strictly protected; subject only to the necessities of military operations. All private property taken for military use should be paid for or receipted for; pillage and waste should be treated as high crimes; all unnecessary trespass sternly prohibited; and offensive demeanor by the military towards citizens promptly rebuked. Military arrests should not be tolerated, except in places where active hostilities exist; and oaths not required by enactments -- Constitutionally made -- should be neither demanded nor received. Military government should be confined to the preservation of public order and the protection of political rights.
Military power should not be allowed to interfere with the relations of servitude, either by supporting or impairing the authority of the master; except for repressing disorder as in other cases. Slaves contraband under the Act of Congress, seeking military protection, should receive it. The right of the Government to appropriate permanently to its own service claims to slave labor should be asserted and the right of the owner to compensation therefore should be recognized. This principle might be extended upon grounds of military necessity and security to all the slaves within a particular state; thus working manumission in such [a] state -- and in Missouri, perhaps in Western Virginia also and possibly even in Maryland the expediency of such a military measure is only a question of time. A system of policy thus constitutional and conservative, and pervaded by the influences of Christianity and freedom, would receive the support of almost all truly loyal men, would deeply impress the rebel masses and all foreign nations, and it might be humbly hoped that it would commend itself to the favor of the Almighty. Unless the principles governing the further conduct of our struggle shall be made known and approved, the effort to obtain requisite forces will be almost hopeless. A declaration of radical views, especially upon slavery, will rapidly disintegrate our present Armies.
The policy of the Government must be supported by concentrations of military power. The national forces should not be dispersed in expeditions, posts of occupation and numerous Armies; but should be mainly collected into masses and brought to bear upon the Armies of the Confederate States; those Armies thoroughly defeated, the political structure which they support would soon cease to exist.
In carrying out any system of policy which you may form, you will require a Commander in Chief of the Army; one who possesses your confidence, understands your views and who is competent to execute your orders by directing the military forces of the Nation to the accomplishment of the objects by you proposed. I do not ask that place for myself. I am willing to serve you in such position as you may assign me and I will do so as faithfully as ever subordinate served superior.
I may be on the brink of eternity and as I hope forgiveness from my maker I have written this letter with sincerity towards you and from love of my country.
Very respectfully your obdt svt
Geo B McClellan
Maj Genl Comdg
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A SOLDIER'S RECOLLECTIONS
McKim, Randolph Harrison, 1842-1920
CHAPTER I
ON THE BRINK OF THE MAELSTROM
ON a bright morning in the month of April, 1861, there is a sudden explosion of excitement at the University of Virginia. Shouts and cheers are heard from the various precincts where the students lodge. Evidently something unusual has occurred. The explanation is soon found as one observes all eyes turned to the dome of the rotunda from whose summit the Secession flag is seen waving. It has been placed there during the night by persons then unknown. Of course it has no right there, for the University is a State institution and the State has not seceded; on the contrary the Constitutional Convention has given only a few days before a strong vote or the Union.
But it is evident the foreign flag is a welcome intruder in the precincts of Jefferson's University, for a great throng of students is presently assembled on the lawn in front of the lofty flight of steps leading up to the rotunda, and one after another of the leaders of the young men mounts the steps and harangues the crowd in favor of the Southern Confederacy and the Southern flag waving proudly up there. Among the speakers I recall Wm. Randolph Berkeley, the recently elected orator of the Jefferson Society.
So general was the sympathy with the Southern cause that not a voice was raised in condemnation of the rebellious and burglarious act of the students who must have been guilty of raising the Southern flag. Not so general was the approval of the professors; some of these were strong Union men, among them one who was deservedly revered by the whole student body, Prof. John B. Minor, the head of the Law Department. Walking up under the arcades to his lecture room, he was shocked at the sight that met his eyes, and (so a wag afterwards reported) broke forth into rhyme as follows:
"Flag of my country, can it be
That that rages up there instead of thee!"
Meantime the excitement waxed greater and greater, so much so that the students forsook their lecture rooms to attend the mass-meeting on the lawn. In vain did Prof. Schele de Vere endeavor to fix the attention of his class by the swelling periods of his famous lecture on Joan of Arc. The proceedings outside on the lawn interested them much more than the tragic fate of the Maid of Orleans, and one after another they rose and stalked out of the lecture room to join in the overture to another and more tremendous tragedy then unfolding itself to the world, until the baffled professor of modern languages gave up the attempt and abruptly closed his lecture.
At this juncture the burly form of Dr. Albert Taylor Bledsoe, professor of mathematics, was seen mounting the steps of the rotunda, his great head as usual far in advance of the rest of his body. At once there was silence in the throng. To him the students gave a respectful attention, such as, I fear, in their then mood, they would not have given to Professor Minor. For Dr. Bledsoe was an enthusiastic advocate of Secession, to such an extent that he would not infrequently interlard his demonstration of some difficult problem in differential or integral calculus--for example, the lemniscata of Bernouilli--with some vigorous remarks in the doctrine of States' rights.
At this juncture, however, the big-brained professor spoke to the young men in a somewhat different strain. He began by saying he had no doubt the students who had put up that flag were "the very nicest fellows in the University," but, inasmuch as the State of Virginia had not yet seceded, the Secession flag did not really belong on that rotunda, and he hoped the students themselves would take it down,--"but," he said, "young gentlemen, do it very tenderly."
The facts of the case were these. A group of seven students (of whom I was one) bought the bunting and had the flag made, seven stars and three bars, by some young lady friends who were bound to secrecy, and then, having supplied themselves with augers and small saws, they went to work after midnight and sawed their way through five doors to gain access to the roof of the rotunda, where, in their stocking feet, they at length succeeded, not without risk of a fatal fall, in giving the "Stars and Bars" to the breeze, just as the first faint streaks of dawn appeared on the eastern hills. They then scattered and betook themselves to bed, and were the last men in the University to hear the news that the Secession flag was floating over the rotunda!
It was not many days after this occurrence that Mr. Lincoln issued his proclamation calling upon Virginia to furnish her quota of troops to coerce the seceded States back into the Union, and thereby instantly transformed the old Commonwealth from a Union State into a seceded State. All differences now disappeared among her statesmen and her people, and Virginia with entire unanimity threw in her lot with her Southern sisters "for better, for worse, for weal or for woe."
It was the threat of invasion that revolutionized the position of the State of Virginia. In illustration of this I refer to the case of a talented young man from Richmond who had been an extreme and uncompromising "Union man"-- the most extreme among all the students at the University. He was also bold and aggressive in the advocacy of his opinions, so much so that he became very unpopular, and his friends feared "serious trouble and even bloody collision." The morning President Lincoln's proclamation appeared he had gone down town on personal business before breakfast, and while there happened to glance at a paper. He returned at once to the University, but not to breakfast; spoke not a word to any human being; packed his trunk with his belongings; left a note for the chairman of the faculty explaining his conduct; boarded the first train for Richmond, and joined a military company before going to his father's house or taking so much as a morsel of food. What was the overwhelming force which thus in a moment transformed this splendid youth? Was it not the God-implanted instinct which impels a man to defend his own hearthstone?
The visitor to the University to-day will see on the rotunda porch two large bronze tablets on the right and left of the central door, on which are graven the names of the alumni who laid down their lives in the Civil War for the independence of the South. There are just five hundred and three names.
The number itself is significant. If five hundred died, there must have been more than two thousand five hundred, perhaps as many as three thousand, on the rolls of the Confederate armies, who called this University mother. We have no accurate register of the number of alumni who were living in 1861 and fit for military service. But we do know that of the six hundred and twenty-five who were students here when the tocsin of war sounded, five hundred and thirty hailed from the seceding States, and about five hundred and fifteen went to the front. Two of the professors followed their students,--our illustrious professor of Greek, Basil L. Gildersleeve, who was wounded fighting with Gordon in the valley of Virginia--he still lives, thank God! to adorn American scholarship--and Lewis Minor Coleman, our right royal professor of Latin, who fell gloriously while commanding a battalion of artillery at Fredericksburg.
These numbers are significant. They bear eloquent witness, not only to the gallantry of our brother alumni, but to the unanimity of the Southern people in that great struggle, and they afford convincing proof of the falsity of the theory, held by some historians of the Civil War, that the uprising of the Southern people was the result of a conspiracy of a few ambitious leaders. When we see five hundred and fifteen out of six hundred and twenty-five students, representing the flower of the intellect and culture of the South-- its yeomen as well as its aristocracy--spring to arm at the first sound of the long roll, we realize that the resistance offered to coercion in 1861 was in no sense artificial, but free and spontaneous, and that it was the act of the people, not of the politicians.
This conclusion may be fortified by a comparison with the record of a great New England university. The memorial tablets at Harvard contain the names of one hundred and seventeen of her alumni who gave their lives to the cause of the Union, while the whole number who entered the Union army and navy was nine hundred and thirty-eight. If the same proportion of loss held among the men of our Alma Mater, then there would have been four thousand students and alumni of the University of Virginia in the army and navy of the Confederate States. But the proportion of killed in action was greater on our side, so that this total must be much reduced. We know from the records that not less than two thousand five hundred of the men who followed the battle flag of the Southern Cross were sons of this Virginia University. The actual number was probably considerably larger. Thus though her students and alumni of military age were less numerous than those of Harvard, in something like the proportion of four to seven, yet there were more than three times as many of them serving with the colors in the great conflict; and while one hundred and seventeen men of the Cambridge university laid down their lives for the Union, five hundred and three of the men of the University of Virginia died for the Southern cause--more than four times as many.
As I think of some of these brave young fellows, I recall the scene that used to be presented many an afternoon on the slope of the hill directly to the south of the University lawn--D'Alphonse, the stalwart professor of gymnastics, leading his numerous pupils in singing the "Marsellaise," or "Les Girondins." The clear fresh voices of those fine young fellows come back to me as I write,--the fine tenor of Robert Falligant rising above the rest,--singing:
"Par la voix du cannon d'alarme,
La France appelle ses enfants,
Allons, dit le soldat, aux armes,
C'est ma mère, je la defends.
Chorus,
"Mourir pour la patrie,
Mourir pour la patrie,
C'est le sort le plus beau
Le plus digne d'envie!"
Alas! how soon and how unexpectedly were those words to be exemplified on the field of battle, in the gallant deaths of many who sang them then, with little realization of their possible significance for them.
There were two military companies organized at the University the autumn before the fateful cloud of Civil War burst upon the land. These were in no way connected with the organization of the institution, but were purely private and voluntary. One called itself "The Sons of Liberty," the other took the name of "The Southern Guard." To the latter I belonged, and when Virginia joined the Confederacy, these two companies of boys were ordered to Winchester, Va., to join in the movement of Gen. Thomas J. Jackson against Harper's Ferry.
I remember that after a long railway ride in box cars (which sadly tarnished our uniforms) we were detrained at Strasburg, and marched to Winchester, eighteen miles distant, beating handsomely in the march the regular companies of State militia that formed part of the expedition.
The two University companies remained several weeks at Harper's Ferry, and were then very properly ordered back to their studies. I did not tarry so long, but made my way to Baltimore, where stirring scenes had been witnessed on the 19th of April, when the Massachusetts troops en route to Washington were attacked by the populace.
Arrived there I very soon found "nothing would be doing," --advices from Confederate headquarters in Virginia discouraging any attempt in that quarter, and so after about a week's sojourn, I returned to the University, promising my mother to stay till the end of the session.
While in Baltimore at dear old "Belvidere," the beautiful home of my childhood and boyhood, I had to endure the pain of my father's displeasure, because of my espousal of the Southern cause. He himself had been in warm personal sympathy with the South, but through the strong intellectual influence of a near relative his political sympathy had been turned to the North. His heart was with my mother's people, but his head turned him to the side of the Union. I mention it because this difference was, by reason of our great mutual attachment, very painful to us both.
In an interview between us, when he had expressed himself in severe condemnation of my course, I turned and said with much feeling, "Well, father, I comfort myself with the promise, 'When my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up.' " And so we parted never to meet again, for he died in January, 1865. A noble and high-minded man he was, and particularly devoted to me. Nothing but the strongest conviction of duty could have led me to act contrary to his wishes. During the whole war I constantly sent him messages of love, and sometimes wrote to him. When my marriage took place, February 26, 1863, he sent my bride a beautiful present with his likeness. My first child was named for him, "John," to which I added "Duncan" for my much-loved cousin. When my ordination was approaching, in April, 1864, I wrote him as follows:
"My father, I ask to be remembered at the family altar, that God may prepare me for the responsible office which I am about tremblingly to undertake after seven months' study."
No picture of this crucial epoch is a true one which suppresses these most painful divisions of sentiment which often occurred in devoted families.
When I returned to the University I had lost, first and last, six weeks at a critical part of my course. My "tickets," this my second year, were French, German, moral philosophy, and senior mathematics. I determined to drop German and concentrate on the other three schools. And then, finding the "math." examination coming on in ten days, I gave my whole time to preparation for that severe test. Such was the excitement among the students, many of whom
were already leaving to join the Army, that study was very difficult, so I betook myself to a little one-room structure at the foot of Carr's Hill on the north side isolated from other buildings, and there studied the differential and integral calculus from twelve to fourteen hours a day for the ten days before examination, Sunday excepted, with the result that on the day of the test I soon developed a severe headache, which nearly cost me my diploma. However, I passed, and later passed also in my other tickets, and received the three diplomas on Commencement day, much to my satisfaction.
These, with diplomas in Latin and Greek taken the previous year, made the path clear to the coveted and difficult honor of M.A. the third year. But that "third year" never came. It was "knocked out" by four years in the school of war under Stonewall Jackson and Lee. And when these were passed, I had entered on the active duties of life.
I wrote to my mother, June 20th, as follows: "I stand moral philosophy on Tuesday next. To-morrow and next day I am to read two essays in the Moral class,--one on two of Butler's sermons, one on a chapter in the Analogy. I got through French examination very well, I believe, but I am scared about my last math. examination. I find that I mistook one of the questions."
Mr. Hall has just made his appearance and handed me your letter and dear Margie's. It grieved me to the quick to find that you are still in ignorance of my real position in Virginia now, and I confess I almost felt self-reproached when you said that you were perfectly satisfied with my promise not to join the Southern Army "without my father's consent." I recollect full well writing the letter, and that was the thing which has kept me back so long from following what I have felt my duty to my country. This made me change my mind about joining when I had almost made up my mind to it some time ago, and this made me resolve to use every effort to get home and try and get consent to do so. I would not now be in the army, and would be at home, I expect, if the condition of things in Baltimore had not rendered it pretty certain that I would be arrested because I went in arms to Harper's Ferry.
I say then in justification of my course that I could not get home safely to get advice, and I felt very hopeful that papa, as most other Union men in Baltimore, had changed his sentiments when he found that the government means to establish a despotism and call it by the sacred name of Union. I do not now believe, after learning that I am disappointed to a great extent in this expected change so far, that papa will not finally cease to support what he has believed a free and righteous government, when he finds beyond contradiction that Lincoln has overthrown the government of our forefathers and abolished every principle of the Declaration of Independence.
My dear, dear mother, I could hardly restrain tears in the midst of all the confusion and bustle of the camp this morning when I read your letter with those renewed expressions of your tender love for me. Oh, I hope you will not think me unworthy of such a love. If I have erred, do be lenient to me, you and papa both, and do not disown your son for doing what he felt to be a holy duty to his country. Papa, if you place yourself in my position, with the profound conviction I have of the holiness and righteousness of this Cause, ask yourself whether you would not have unhesitatingly done what I have done. You have yourself, in my hearing, placed the duty of country first in this world's duties and second only to the duty I owe my God. How then am I reprehensible for obeying what my very heart of hearts told me was my country's call, when I had some hope that your will would not be at variance with it, and I was unable to find out whether it was or not?
I have suffered much in mind and still do suffer. At all events I am not actuated by selfish or cowardly motives. How easy it would have been to sit down at quiet Belvidere, preserving an inactivity which all my friends would have regarded as honorable, than at the possible loss of your parental love and care, and at the sacrifice of my comforts and the risk of my life, to do what I have done-- enlist as a common soldier (i.e., a volunteer private) in the cause of liberty and right! Camp life is a hard life--I know by experience. Forced marches, scanty provisions sometimes, menial offices to perform, perfect discipline to submit to, are not attractive features to anyone. Then military life has little charm for me. I have no taste for it, and no ambition for military glory. But I am ready and willing to suffer all these hardships, and, when necessary, to lay my life upon the altar of my country's freedom.
I hope I do not seem to boast or to glorify myself in speaking thus, but if I know my own heart this is the truth, and God give me grace to be consistent with this profession. Do not, my precious mother, be too much alarmed and too anxious about me. I trust and hope that God will protect me from "the terror by night" and "the destruction that wasteth at noon-day." I feel as if my life was to be spared. I hope yet to preach the Gospel of the Jesus Christ; but, my dear mother, we are in God's hands, and He doth not willingly afflict or grieve the children of men. "He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty." He does all things well, and He will give you grace to bear this trial too. Farewell, dear mother and father, Telfair, Mary, and Margie. I am, in this life and the next,
Your fond and affectionate
RANDOLPH
(letter from Randolph McKim, letter to his mother)
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