Stark Mad Abolitionists

by Robert K. Sutton

  While industry in Lawrence was on the upswing, farmers in the surrounding area had dealt with the ups and downs of growing crops since they had first settled the area. But the economic and environmental crises in 1873 were particularly devastating. As if these factors were not enough, the railroads that were so important for shipping agricultural products gouged farmers with shipping costs. To face these multiple issues, farmers banded together to collectively improve their situation. Twenty-eight farmers near the small community of Vinland, about a dozen miles south of Lawrence, organized a chapter of the Patrons of Husbandry (commonly referred as the Grange) in 1873. Collectively, they purchased feed, seed, and machinery at wholesale prices for their members. Their Grange Hall, built in 1883 and still standing, provided a center for social activities on the second floor and a store for farm supplies on the first.317 The national Grange organization provided financial aid to farmers in times of hardship, and in time, it negotiated more favorable freight costs on railroads. In many ways, the Grange harkened back to the free-state movement from years earlier. The antislavery residents joined forces to protect their homes and businesses and to ensure that the state they were creating was free. In much the same way, Grangers joined together for their common economic and social interests.

  Agriculture and industry in Lawrence and the surrounding area provided opportunities for a new educational institution, which opened in 1884. The local US congressman, Dudley Haskell, brother of architect John Haskell, was instrumental in locating the United States Indian Industrial Training School in his hometown. Haskell Institute—the name was later changed to honor the congressman, who died before the school opened—was created in an era in which white American liberalism and guilt led to the belief that the survival of American Indians could only happen if the children were placed in government-run Indian schools. The purpose was to separate children from their Indian culture and make them into “white, Christian” American farmers, domestic workers, or laborers. The people of Lawrence embraced the new school, believing that they were doing their part to save America’s indigenous people from extinction.318

  Amos Adams Lawrence, Harvard University Portrait Collection, gift of Friends of Amos Lawrence to Harvard University, H190.

  After the turmoil of “Bleeding Kansas” and the Civil War, and as Lawrence was developing into a modern community, Rev. Dr. Cordley (the University of Kansas awarded him with an honorary doctor of divinity degree in 1874) sat down to write the history of his adopted town. As the coda, he wrote that “the people of Lawrence were not lovers of strife. Her people were lovers of order and peace…. Now peace had come after all these years of strife. And it was peace that would stay.”319

  In the spring of 1884, Amos Lawrence decided to finally accept the invitation that had been on the table for thirty years—to visit the town in Kansas that bore his name.320 He had been ill off and on during the past winter, and he hoped the trip would improve his health. Since he would turn seventy in a couple of weeks, he knew that time was running out for a visit, so Lawrence, his wife, his daughter, and Dr. Samuel A. Green, the former mayor of Boston, boarded a train and headed west. When they arrived in Lawrence on May 27, 1884, Lawrence and his party were escorted to Dr. Charles Robinson’s house, which was their headquarters during their visit.

  Amos Lawrence’s visit was a momentous occasion for the town. Many knew that without his generosity thirty years earlier, the town might well have never been built. Plus, his huge monetary gift, some twenty years earlier, was a critical piece in the establishment of the University of Kansas in Lawrence. So the organizers rolled out the red carpet, planning a week of events to honor their guest and to show off their community. On the first day, the group toured the town and ended up at the University of Kansas, where the faculty presented Lawrence with a resolution that recognized his “generosity which laid the corner-stone of the system of higher education in this commonwealth.” They also invited him to participate in commencement exercises, scheduled toward the end of his visit.

  His schedule for the remainder of the visit included participating as a special guest for Decoration (Memorial) Day, visiting in Topeka, and attending a huge picnic as the guest of honor. Charles Branscomb, the man whom Lawrence and the board of the Emigrant Aid Company sent to scout for a location for the first settlement, planned a special dinner as well. At the conclusion of the festivities in Lawrence, Amos Lawrence and his party were scheduled to continue on their journey to Colorado.

  The schedule was so ambitious it would have exhausted a younger man. Lawrence was not young and was still recovering from his winter ailments. After a couple of days, he cut short his trip and returned to Boston. In his diary he wrote that “the reception was so generous and overwhelming that it was too much.” Later, Lawrence intimated to his son that because he was a very private man who shunned public attention, being placed in the limelight made him very uncomfortable.321

  Even though Amos Lawrence cut short his visit, the time he spent at the University of Kansas was important to him. Higher education was something he vigorously supported throughout his life. From the time he graduated from Harvard, he supported his alma mater with his energy and his money. In 1847, he donated $10,000, matched by the Methodist Church, to establish Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin, which became the second coeducational college in the country. When he helped to create Lawrence, Kansas, he never wavered in his goal to help create a college there. During his visit to the University of Kansas, his hosts noted that a portion of his financial donation to help found the university was used to ensure that the children who survived Quantrill’s Raid, as well as children of Kansas soldiers killed in the Civil War, would be exempt from paying any tuition or fees.322 Lawrence continued his practice of generously giving his time and money to those in need until his death in 1886.

  The “stark mad abolitionists” who came to Lawrence in the 1850s probably would be pleased to see that the town they created remains a liberal island in the current sea of Kansas conservatism. In the 2016 presidential election, Donald Trump defeated Hillary Clinton in Kansas 57 percent to 36 percent. In Douglas County (where Lawrence is located), however, Clinton defeated Trump 63 percent to 29 percent. The abolitionists who founded Lawrence were the radicals of their day, on the far left side of the antislavery movement. In many ways, they were out of step with other antislavery advocates. But they successfully made Kansas a free state and played a significant role in bringing the nation into the recognition of the evils of the institution of slavery.

  Monument to Quantrill victims in Lawrence, Kansas. Kansas State Historical Society.

  The pioneers would also be pleased to know of their continuing legacy. When fourth graders study Kansas history, their teachers take to them to the significant sites in Lawrence that are important to the early history. And each year, on the Saturday closest to the anniversary of Quantrill’s Raid (August 21), the Douglas County Historical Society, the Watkins Museum, Freedom’s Frontier, Lawrence Parks and Recreation, and other organizations sponsor tours, lectures, musical programs, and a wide variety of special events. Included are tours of the historic Oak Hill Cemetery located on land set aside by the citizens of Lawrence to honor the victims of Quantrill’s Raid. Volunteers read the names of all of victims of the raid. Tour participants see the graves of the many early Lawrence residents—James Lane, the Haskell brothers, John Speer, Charles and Sara Robinson, and many others. They also are directed to the monument erected in 1895 to the victims of Quantrill’s Massacre. While there, the tour guides remind the group of sacrifices early Lawrence residents suffered in its important role in the struggle to rid the nation of slavery.

  Appendix: What Happened to the Players in This Story?

  WHEN WE LAST ENCOUNTERED ANTHONY Burns, he was led to a ship in Boston Harbor, in chains, awaiting his return to slavery. In the first four months of his return to captivity, things went from bad to worse for Burns. His owner, Charles F. Suttle, sent him to a Richmond sl
ave jail where he was held in chains, which left him permanently crippled and in ill health for the remainder of his short life. Immediately after his capture, the abolitionist community of Boston tried to purchase his freedom, offering as much as $1,200. Suttle instead sold him to David McDaniel, a slave trader, from Rocky Mount, North Carolina, for $910.

  In the spring of 1855, a group of African Americans in Boston bought his freedom for $1,300. Burns returned to Boston and eventually studied theology at Oberlin College and Fairmont Theological Seminary in Cincinnati. In 1858, he went to Maine, where he prepared a traveling exhibit called “The Grand Moving Mirror,” portraying the “degradation and horror of American slavery.” Burns planned to travel with the exhibition through New England, but his ill health thwarted his plans. In 1860, he became the minister at a Baptist church in Indianapolis. He then moved to the Zion Baptist Church in Saint Catherines, Upper Canada (present-day Ontario). Burns died in Canada at age twenty-eight in July 1862 from consumption (tuberculosis), never having regained his health.

  Not long after his visit to Kansas, Amos Adams Lawrence again joined forces with Eli Thayer to establish the “Utah Emigrant Aid Company,” modeled on the Kansas group, with the purpose of encouraging non-polygamous non-Mormons to migrate to Utah. The effort flopped, mostly because Utah Mormons recognized that their only path to statehood required the abolition of polygamy. Lawrence continued his lifelong practice of generously giving his time and money to Harvard and temperance programs, and by helping individuals in need, whether they were people who had worked for him, schoolmates or friends who had fallen on hard times, or even people he did not know. His family continued to be the most important part of his life, and remained his greatest source of strength and joy right up until his death in 1886.

  Eli Thayer was elected as a Republican to Congress, where he served from 1857 to 1861, his second term as chairman of the Committee on Public Lands. He never lost his itch to start up new communities. He tried to duplicate his effort in Kansas by organizing the town of Credo in Virginia (later part of West Virginia) as well as his partnership with Lawrence to flood Utah with non-Mormons. Both endeavors were unsuccessful. Later in life, he engaged in railroad and other business pursuits, and he unsuccessfully ran for Congress again in 1872. His legacy, however, was always tied to the Emigrant Aid Company. Amos Lawrence later said that “he [Thayer] never faltered in his faith, and he inspired confidence everywhere.” Eli Thayer lived in Worcester until his death in 1899.

  The Reverend Thomas Wentworth Higginson volunteered for, and quickly rose to the rank of captain in, the 51st Massachusetts Infantry in the Civil War. He was wounded in action in August 1862. When he recovered, he was appointed colonel of the 1st South Carolina Volunteers—made up almost entirely of former slaves. The 1st South Carolina later became the 33rd US Colored Troops (USCT). The USCT along with the 54th Massachusetts black infantry regiment participated in the assault on Fort Wagner, as depicted in the film Glory. Higginson recorded his experience in Army Life in a Black Regiment (1870), in which he described his experiences commanding his regiment, and for posterity he wrote down the Negro spirituals his men sang around the campfire in their own dialect. “Until the blacks were armed,” he wrote, “there was no guaranty of their freedom. It was their demeanor under arms that shamed the nation into recognizing them as men.”

  Following the war, Higginson “discovered” Emily Dickinson. As a regular contributor to the Atlantic Monthly, in one of his articles he encouraged young, aspiring writers to publish their works. Thirty-one-year-old Emily Dickinson responded, sending along four poems. Following the first encounter, the two corresponded frequently, and after Dickinson died in 1886, Higginson edited and published Dickinson’s poems. After a long and very fruitful life, Higginson died in 1911 at the age of eighty-seven.

  The Reverend Henry Ward Beecher continued as minister at Plymouth Congregational Church in Brooklyn for the remainder of his life. He was at odds with American theologians in that he embraced Darwin’s theory of evolution as compatible with the Bible. During the early 1870s, however, his personal life and reputation took a severe beating. Elizabeth Tilton, a member of his congregation, confessed to her husband, Theodore, that she had had an affair with Beecher. Through much of his entire ministry, there were innuendoes that Beecher’s wandering eyes had led to affairs with female congregants. But this affair took on a life of its own. The media picked up the story, which provided some of the juiciest headlines of the time. Eventually, Theodore Tilton sued Beecher for adultery in 1875. Beecher was exonerated with a hung jury, and his church exonerated him as well, but the episode nearly broke him financially. He continued as a popular lecturer and eventually recouped his finances. He died, solvent again, in 1887.

  Senator James H. Lane was a staunch supporter of Lincoln for reelection. He also ran for reelection to the US Senate and won. As a senator, Lane had supported most of the administration’s policies and was firmly in the camp of the Radical Republicans concerning issues relating to African Americans. He often went well beyond the administration, supporting increased rights for blacks—especially former slaves. But after President Lincoln’s assassination, when Andrew Johnson became president, Lane did a complete about-face, supporting Johnson’s reconstruction policies, including the president’s veto of the Civil Rights Bill. In addition, there were revelations of questionable financial dealings concerning government contracts. He lost the support of his constituents almost overnight. Tragically, Lane shot himself on July 1, 1866, while visiting his brother-in-law in Leavenworth. He died ten days later.

  Lane was one of the most colorful, interesting, and enigmatic politicians in Kansas history. His suicide at age fifty-two not only ended his life but in many ways ended a major part of the early history of Kansas. Few were as fascinating or as controversial, loved or hated with as much passion as James Henry Lane.

  Charles and Sara Robinson remained in Lawrence for the remainder of their lives. Charles was instrumental in the establishment of the University of Kansas in Lawrence and served on the board during much of its early years. He helped found the Kansas Historical Society and served as its president. He also was president of Haskell Indian School. Charles died in 1894, but Sara lived almost another twenty years. According to her biographer, she “used her pen to fight those she saw as trying to rewrite Kansas history,” especially those who attempted “to denigrate her husband’s legacy in order to promote the memory of James Lane.” 323 The Robinsons left no heirs, so when Sara died, she left much of their considerable estate to the University of Kansas. Much of the present campus is built on land they donated.

  Dr. John Doy left Lawrence to promote his book The Narrative of John Doy, of Lawrence, Kansas: An Unvarnished Tale in the East and to drum up support for Abraham Lincoln’s election in 1860. In 1861, his son Charles was killed in an ambush in Moneka, in south-central Kansas. In 1862, John moved his family to Battle Creek, Michigan. In 1869, he was convicted of procuring an abortion for a young woman, and committed suicide with an overdose of morphine while awaiting sentencing, claiming he would never go to jail again.

  In 2005, an archeological team from Washburn University found what was likely the site of John Doy’s house. The team excavated the foundation and found a rich collection of artifacts from the 1850s time frame. The students knew absolutely nothing about John Doy before they started the project, and they were intrigued with his story, which supplemented the archeological discoveries.324

  When William Clarke Quantrill’s guerrilla band split into the factions led by “Bloody Bill” Anderson and George Todd in 1864, Quantrill lay low in Missouri, but following the deaths of Anderson and Todd in October, he again resumed leadership of a much smaller band and led his guerrillas into western Kentucky.325 Quantrill and his men wore Union uniforms and claimed to be part of the 4th Missouri Cavalry, and as its leader, he used the pseudonym of Captain Clarke. He and his men had some success in Kentucky, and found Confederate sympathizers who provid
ed shelter and food, but eventually, the Union forces recognized who he was and started pursuing him in earnest. Major General John M. Palmer, the commanding officer in Kentucky, assigned Edwin Terrell the exclusive charge to pursue Quantrill, with orders to bring him back dead or alive. Terrell caught up with Quantrill on May 10, 1865, several weeks after nearly all Confederate forces had surrendered. Quantrill was shot in the spine, paralyzed, and transported to a prison hospital in Louisville, where he died on June 6.

  While Quantrill was lingering between life and death, he became a devout Roman Catholic and was given last rites. He was buried in an unmarked grave in a local cemetery. The disposition of his remains became a truly bizarre story. One of Quantrill’s boyhood friends, William W. Scott, claimed to have brought Quantrill’s remains back to Dover at the request of Quantrill’s mother. Scott also tried to sell some of Quantrill’s bones to collectors. Then, in the early 1990s, the Missouri division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans arranged for some of Quantrill’s remains to be taken from Ohio and reburied in a Confederate cemetery in Higginsville, Missouri.

  The story of Quantrill and his guerrillas did not end with his death. Several members of his band embarked on lives of crime after the war. Many of Quantrill’s men stayed in touch with one another and started holding reunions, which continued until nearly all members were dead. Today, the William Clarke Quantrill Society continues to perpetuate his legacy.326 Numerous films and books, in both fiction and fact, continue the story of William Clarke Quantrill and his guerrillas.