Project Gutenberg's Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2, by George Hoar

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Title: Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2

Author: George Hoar

Release Date: October 15, 2006 [EBook #19548] [Last updated on May 30, 2007]

Language: English

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF SEVENTY ***

Produced by Ed Ferris

[Frontispiece: v1.jpg]
SENATOR GEORGE F. HOAR
  From a photograph taken in 1897
  Copyright, 1897, by H. Schervee, Worcester, Mass.

[Title page]
AUTOBIOGRAPHY
OF SEVENTY YEARS

BY GEORGE F. HOAR

WITH PORTRAITS

VOLUME I.

NEW YORK CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 1903

[Dedication]
TO
MY WIFE AND CHILDREN
THIS RECORD OF A LIFE WHICH
THEY HAVE MADE HAPPY
IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED

[Table of Contents]
CONTENTS

CHAPTER I INTRODUCTORY

CHAPTER II ROGER SHERMAN AND HIS FAMILY

CHAPTER III SAMUEL HOAR

CHAPTER IV BOYHOOD IN CONCORD

CHAPTER V FAMOUS CONCORD MEN

CHAPTER VI FARM AND SCHOOL

CHAPTER VII HARVARD SIXTY YEARS AGO

CHAPTER VIII 1849 TO 1850—FOUNDATION OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY— DANIEL WEBSTER

CHAPTER IX LIFE IN WORCESTER

CHAPTER X POLITICAL HISTORY OF MASSACHUSETTS FROM 1848 TO 1869

CHAPTER XI THE KNOW NOTHING PARTY AND ITS OVERTHROW

CHAPTER XII ELECTION TO CONGRESS

CHAPTER XIII SUMNER AND WILSON

CHAPTER XIV PERSONALITIES IN DEBATE

CHAPTER XV THE NATIONAL HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES IN 1869

CHAPTER XVI POLITICAL CONDITION IN 1869

CHAPTER XVII RECONSTRUCTION

CHAPTER XVIII COMMITTEE SERVICE IN THE HOUSE

CHAPTER XIX SALMON P. CHASE

CHAPTER XX ADIN THAYER

CHAPTER XXI POLITICAL CORRUPTION

CHAPTER XXII CREDIT MOBILIER

CHAPTER XXIII THE SANBORN CONTRACTS

CHAPTER XXIV BENJAMIN F. BUTLER

CHAPTER XXV BELKNAP IMPEACHMENT

CHAPTER XXVI ELECTORAL COMMISSION

CHAPTER XXVII FOUR NATIONAL CONVENTIONS, 1876

CHAPTER XXVIII FOUR NATIONAL CONVENTIONS, 1880

CHAPTER XXIX FOUR NATIONAL CONVENTIONS, 1884

CHAPTER XXX FOUR NATIONAL CONVENTIONS, 1888

CHAPTER XXXI SATURDAY CLUB

CHAPTER XXXII THE WORCESTER FIRE SOCIETY

APPENDIX I.

APPENDIX II.

[Text]
AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF SEVENTY YEARS

CHAPTER I INTRODUCTORY

Everybody who reads this book through will wonder that a man who ought to be able to tell so much has really told so little.

I have known personally and quite intimately, or have known intelligent and trustworthy persons who have known personally and quite intimately, many men who have had a great share in the history of this country and in its literature for a hundred and thirty years.

In my younger days there were among my kindred and near friends persons who knew the great actors of the Revolutionary time and the time which followed till I came to manhood myself. But I did not know enough to ask questions. If I had, and had recorded the answers, I could write a very large part of the political and literary history of the United States. I never kept a diary, except for a few and brief periods. So for what I have to say, I must trust to my memory. I have no doubt that after these volumes are published, there will come up in my mind matter enough to make a dozen better ones.

I invoke for this book that kindly judgment of my countrymen which has attended everything I have done in my life so far. I have tried to guard against the dangers and the besetting infirmities of men who write their own biography. An autobiography, as the word implies, will be egotistical. An old man's autobiography is pretty certain to be garrulous. If the writer set forth therein his own ideals, he is likely to be judged by them, even when he may fall far short of them. Men are likely to think that he claims or pretends to have lived up to them, however painfully conscious he may be that they are only dreams which even if he have done his best have had little reality for him.

There is another danger for a man who tells the story of great transactions, in which he has taken part, whether legislative, executive, military, or political, or any other, in which the combined action of many persons was required for the result. He is apt to claim, consciously or unconsciously, that he himself brought the whole thing about.

"Papa," said the little boy to the veteran of the Civil War,
"Did anybody help you to put down the Rebellion?"

This peril specially besets narrators in their old age. I am afraid I can hardly escape it.

I once heard General George H. Thomas relate to a brilliant company at a supper party, among whom were Chief Justice Chase, General Eaton, Commissary General in two wars, Senator Trumbull, William M. Evarts, Joseph Henry, John Sherman, his brother the General, and several other gentlemen of equal distinction, the story of the battles of Nashville and Franklin. The story was full of dramatic interest. Yet no one who heard it would have known that the speaker himself had taken part in the great achievement, until, just at the end, he said of the Battle of Nashville that he thought of sending a detachment to cut off Hood's army at a ford by which he escaped after they were defeated, but he concluded that it was not safe to spare that force from immediate use in the battle. "If I had done it," he added, with great simplicity, "I should have captured his whole army. There is where I made my mistake."

The recollections of the actors in important political transactions are doubtless of great historic value. But I ought to say frankly that my experience has taught me that the memory of men, even of good and true men, as to matters in which they have been personal actors, is frequently most dangerous and misleading. I could recount many curious stories which have been told me by friends who have been writers of history and biography, of the contradictory statements they have received from the best men in regard to scenes in which they have been present.

If any critic think this book lacking in dignity, or wisdom, or modesty, it is hoped that it may, by way of offset, make up for it in sincerity. I have so far lived in the world without secrets. If my countrymen, or the people of Massachusetts, have trusted me, they have fully known what they were doing. "They had eyes and chose me."

I have never lifted any finger or spoken a word to any man to secure or to promote my own election to any office. I do not mean to criticise other men who advance their honorable ambition for public service or exert themselves to get office for which