2. Writing to Mrs. Clay from the Department of the Interior, late in 1885, E. V. D. Miller said of Mr. Lamar, then Secretary of the Interior: “Those nearest in his labours only understand and have compassion for him, to try to save him all we can. He would take us all in his arms, and confer the greatest benefits on us if he could; and a more tender, appreciative, industrious, kind-hearted man I have never been associated with, to say nothing of his giant intellect and cultivated brain and taste. I never knew him until I came to this office with him and saw him in all these entangling relations. I used to get angry and avoid him because I thought he neglected my requests and was so indifferent that there seemed to be a lack of respect; but a closer knowledge of the demands upon him have disarmed me entirely, and I fight him no longer.” A. S.

3. As Governor of Ohio.

4. “President Pierce was one of the handsomest men I have ever seen!” was the remark of Colonel Watterson to me, while dwelling on those ante-bellum personages. A. S.

5. “I remember,” said General Joseph Wheeler, “hearing of those innovations, and that the guests entered the dining-room two by two, and left it in the same order, to the music of the orchestra. They introduced the custom of announcing the arrival of each guest at receptions, by having a functionary call the name, aloud, a novelty against which a good many rebelled.” A. S.

6. Wrote the Assistant Attorney-General, William A. Maury, in 1885, to Judge Campbell: “I called on the President in company with Judge Gilbert and Mr. Corcoran, and, a most fitting opportunity having occurred in the course of our talk, I pleased the President greatly by telling him you said he was the biggest man who had been in the White House since you were a child! Which Mr. Corcoran supplemented by saying, ‘And Judge Campbell is a man who means what he says!’”

7. Held between Messrs. Cleveland, President-elect, and Bayard in the official residence, which is segregated from the Capitol.

8. Asbury Dickens, Clerk of the Senate.

9. In a letter dated New York, April 6, 1861, a correspondent, the intimate associate of James Gordon Bennett, wrote as follows: “I have been in Washington twice since I had the pleasure of seeing you, and I can say truthfully, that... the ensemble of the personnel of the White House has sadly changed, more befitting a restaurant than the House of the President. They tell me many droll stories of them, and all are deservedly rich. ‘Old Abe’ tells stories and Mrs. Lincoln simpers. They keep a household of those horrid... people with them all the time, mais assez!”

10. Some time after Clement C. Clay’s return to the Confederate States, this cane was purloined by some unknown person. Years passed; one day Mr. Clay received an inquiry as to whether he had ever owned a cane on which his name appeared below that of the Kentucky Senator’s; the writer explained that he wished to know its history and to return the cane to its rightful owner. Eager for the recovery of his valued souvenir, Mr. Clay responded; but his unknown correspondent, having gained the information he sought, lapsed into silence. Said Mrs. Clay, in relating this incident, “And we never heard more of the cane!” A. S.

11. This story, though quite commonly repeated, has been rather effectually disproved by scientists. It obtained currency for many years, however. A. S.

12. A notable vehicle of this sort was purchased in Philadelphia by Mrs. Clay, at a cost of $1,600, and was carried to Alabama, where, among the foliaged avenues of beautiful Huntsville, it attracted universal attention. It was a capacious and splendid equipage, lined with amber satin, and was drawn by the high-bred horses, “Polk” and “Dallas.” From Mrs. Clay’s possession this gorgeous landau passed into that of Governor Reuben Chapman, and, in the course of years, by various transfers, into the hands of a station hackman, of colour! A. S.

13. A reference to Mrs. Emory, a notably attractive member of Washington society.

14. Nevertheless, the chronicler named in rapid succession as among Mrs. Clay’s attendants, Lord Napier, Sir William Gore Ouseley, K.C.B., and many prominent figures in the capital. “Mrs. Senator Clay,” he added in prose, “with knitting in hand, snuff-box in pocket, and ‘Ike the Inevitable’ by her side, acted out her difficult character so as to win the unanimous verdict that her personation of the loquacious malapropos dame was the leading feature of the evening’s entertainment. Go where she would through the spacious halls, a crowd of eager listeners followed her footsteps, drinking in her instant repartees, which were really superior in wit and appositeness, and, indeed, in the vein of the famous dame’s cacoËthes, even to the original contribution of Shillaber to the nonsensical literature of the day.” A. S.

15. While this playful exchange of ideas was going on, Senator Clay stood near his Northern confrÈre, with whom his relations were always courteous and kindly. At Mrs. Clay’s parting sally, Senator Seward turned to the lady’s husband and remarked, “Clay, she’s superb!” “Yes,” replied Senator Clay; “when she married me America lost its Siddons!” A. S.

16. Major Anderson, in command at Fort Sumter.

17. January 9, 1861.

18. General L. Pope Walker.

19. “Talk of disunion, threats of disunion, accusations of intentions of disunion lie scattered plentifully through the political literature of the country from the very formation of the Government,” say Messrs. Nicolay and Hay. See vol. II, page 296, of “Abraham Lincoln.” Also, “Benton’s Thirty Years’ View.” Vol. II, page 786.

20. This fact is emphasised by Messrs. Nicolay and Hay. See vol. I, page 142, “Abraham Lincoln.”

21. Now United States Senator from Alabama.

22. Judge Smith was the grandfather of Mrs. Meredith Calhoun, who, with her husband, played a brilliant part in Paris society when EugÉnie’s triumphs were at their height. A. S.

23. John E. Moore became celebrated on the bench: He declined the office of territorial judge, offered him by President Pierce, but was serving as judge in a military court when he died, in 1864. He was a brother of Colonel Sydenham Moore, who fell at the battle of Seven Pines. A. S.

24. Of Mrs. Clay herself, renowned for her histrionic talent, Mrs. Ives wrote: “It was the hope of having you take the part of Mrs. Malaprop that encouraged me to undertake the amateur production of Sheridan’s play. I felt sure that if all others failed, your acting would redeem all deficiencies. You carried the audience by storm.... I can see you yet, in imagination, in your rich brocaded gown, antique laces and jewels, high puffed and curled hair, with nodding plumes which seemed to add expression to your amusing utterances!” A. S.

25. I asked Mrs. Milton Humes, daughter of ex-Governor Chapman, concerning these war-time search-parties. “I remember distinctly,” she answered, “seeing them look into preserve jars and cut-glass decanters, until my mother’s risibles no longer could be repressed. ‘You don’t expect to find General Walker in that brandy bottle, do you?’ she asked.” A. S.

26. Dr. J. M. Bannister, at the ripe age of eighty-six, still continues in active pastoral charge of the Church of the Nativity in Huntsville. A. S.

27. Harry, son of Buxton Williams.

28. James Camp Turner, of Alabama, died at Manassas.

29. It ended in April, 1865.

30. Then in the Mounted Signal Service, Milligan’s Battalion, from Georgia, and on the staff of General S. D. French, now of Florida. A.S.

31. Son of Senator Hammond, of South Carolina.

32. Many of these possessions are still retained by Messrs. Spann and Harry Hammond.

33. To overcome these conditions, the Right-Reverend William Capers, distinguished in the Methodist Church, organised a wide system of missionary work among the plantation negroes, whereby preaching and catechising by white ministers took place once a month. Many of the great planters assisted in this good work, Senator R. Barnwell Rhett, Sr., being prominently associated with Bishop Capers. Senator Rhett built a large church, which was attended by the negroes from five plantations, and regularly by his own family. A. S.

34. Mother of the unfortunate Mrs. Maybrick.

35. A recent writer attributes to those experiences, the coffee substitutes which now, forty years later, have “ruined the American coffee trade.” A. S.

36. Shortly after his arrival in Canada, Mr. Clay heard of General Lee’s lost favourite. The animal, a fine Newfoundland, had been taken from the Lee home at Arlington by a Federal soldier, who sold it to a Captain Anderson (commanding an English vessel) for one hundred dollars. After some months of inquiry and negotiation, Mr. Clay secured the dog, and personally brought him back to the Confederate States. A. S.

37. Horace Greeley.

38. Printed in Richmond Enquirer, and quoted liberally throughout the North.

39. The family coachman.

40. A gentleman in the War Department—to whom I spoke of a violent protest uttered against General Wheeler’s confiscations, by one Betts (who sent his complaint, long as a Presidential message, to Senator Clay, in Richmond)—smiled a little. “Well,” he said, “Wheeler always would feed his men, you know!” A. S.

41. Speaking of that episode, Mrs. Hammond said to me: “It was months before we succeeded in finding the silver again. Though we dug the ground over and over in every direction where we thought it was, we couldn’t even find the blazes for a long time.” A. S.

42. A cartoon which appeared about this time in a Richmond paper was a graphic demonstration of the shrunk value of Confederate money. It represented a man going to and returning from market. In the first scene he carried a bushel basket piled high with current bills; in the second, the basket was empty, and in his hand was an infinitesimal package, which was supposed to contain a beef steak! A. S.

43. The actual amount offered for Mr. Clay’s apprehension was $25,000; but, in the dissemination of the proclamation through the press, the larger sum was repeatedly given as the amount offered—being so quoted by General Wilson and others. See Records of the Rebellion, series I, vol. XLIX, page 733.

44. Then widow of Congressman Bouligny, of Louisiana, and now Mrs. George Collins Levey, of London, England.

45. Desk.

46. “It were as easy,” wrote one editor, “to suspect General Lee of duplicity, or General Butler of magnanimity, as to think Mr. Clay guilty of the crimes imputed to him!”

47. Neither this application, nor any communication sent by Mrs. Clay to Judge Holt, met with the recognition of acknowledgment. A. S.

48. A reference to Holt’s Report, dated December 8, 1865, will show how little either Mr. Pierce or this great legal light apprehended the audacity of the inquisitorial Military Commission, of which the Secretary of War and Joseph Holt made two. A. S.

49. Several years later Mr. Stevens reiterated these statements to one of the editors of the New York Tribune, who again quoted Mr. Stevens’s remarks in an able editorial. A. S.

50. The letter reads “ult.,” but, being obviously an error, is here changed. A. S.

51. Copies of those addressed by Mr. Clay to the Secretary of War and to President Johnson. A. S.

52. Dr. Craven was already in communication with Dr. Withers, of Petersburg, Va., Mr. Clay’s cousin, who, through the courtesy of his fellow-practitioner, was enabled to contribute occasionally to Mr. Clay’s comfort and welfare. A. S.

53. New York Daily News.

54. To pass by less irreproachable witnesses, the following incident illustrative of Mr. Stanton’s brusquerie to women was told by the Reverend Elisha Dyer. “While sitting in Mr. Stanton’s private office, a well-dressed lady entered. She was rather young, and very captivating. Approaching the Secretary, she said, ‘Excuse me, but I must see you!’ My old friend at once assumed the air of a bear. In a stern voice he said, ‘Madam, you have no right to come into this office, and you must leave it! No, Madam,’ he continued, when she tried to speak, ‘not one word!’ And, calling an orderly, he said, ‘Take this woman out!’” A. S.

55. Mr. Scott’s daughter is the wife of the widely known Dr. Garnett, of Hot Springs, Arkansas.

56. The letter here given is from a copy furnished Mrs. Clay by Robert Morrow, Secretary in 1866.

57. For months Mr. Holt’s Report was steadily refused to the public. Referring to this secretive conduct, in July, 1866, A. J. Rogers said, in the House of Representatives, “Secrecy has surrounded and shrouded, not to say protected, every step of these examinations. In the words of the late Attorney-General, ‘Most of the evidence upon which they [the charges] are based was obtained ex parte, without notice to the accused, and whilst they were in custody in military prisons. Their publication might wrong the Government.’...” The Secretary of War, February 7, 1866, writes to the President that the publication of the Report of the Judge Advocate General is incompatible with the public interests. “This report,” continues Mr. Rogers, “in the testimony it quotes, will show that the interests of the country would never have suffered by the dispensing with illegal secrecy, but that the interests and fame of the Judge Advocate General himself would suffer in the eyes of all the truth-loving and justice-seeking people on earth.” A. S.

58. Hyams, alias Harris, was one of the witnesses who, six months before the date of Mr. Holt’s Report, had been exposed by the Rev. Stuart Robinson, and who, six months later, or less, himself confessed his perjuries to the Judiciary Committee. A. S.

59. But not unimpeachable, as later events proved. They were afterward denounced by Mr. Holt as unprincipled perjurers and the cause of all his trouble. A. S.

60. In fact, as will have been seen elsewhere, Mr. Clay arrived in South Carolina on the fourth of February, 1865, after a full month’s journeying by stormy sea from Nova Scotia to Bermuda; thence on the ill-fated Rattlesnake, which, failing to make its way into port at Wilmington, now in the hands of the Federals, with delay and circumlocution, ran the blockade at Charleston, only to perish under the very ramparts of Fort Moultrie. His return, therefore, was sufficiently dramatic, and known to hundreds of truly unimpeachable witnesses, had the Judge Advocate allowed Mr. Clay to know the charges against him or given him an opportunity for denial. A. S.

61. Conover was the chief witness in the cases of Mrs. Surratt and her companions, and Mr. Holt’s charges against Mr. Clay were based on his testimony and that of others who had been drilled in their parts by Conover. A. S.

62. The public, however, was not destined to be treated to a spectacle so likely to react to the Government’s dishonour. Mr. Holt, who for a year caused to be denied to the prisoners (one of whom had been a Cabinet Minister, the other a United States Senator) even the visits of counsel, now, for some forever unexplained reason, instead of arresting the perjurer Conover, after his admissions in the Committee room of the House, talked to him kindly, and extended him the courtesy of a trip to New York, in order that he might procure further testimony. Once arrived, the polite swindler excused himself to his companion, and, bowing himself out, “was not seen by him thereafter,” said Mr. Holt; and he adds naÏvely, “and up to this time he has not communicated with me, nor has he made any effort, as I believe, to produce the witnesses!” A. S.

63. In part an interview with Mr. Holt, and the whole most obviously inspired by him.

64. Practically the only voice now raised in an attempt to explain or justify the Advocate General’s unique methods. While denying his knavishness, it had the singular appearance of developing his foolishness. A. S.

65. Conover had obviated the necessity for proving, by confessing, his own infamy. A. S.

66. Now for sixteen months a prisoner in Fortress Monroe, and denied trial or counsel! A. S.

67. It is hard to believe that, if Mr. Holt’s reputation had survived the doubt thrown upon it by the House Committee, in the preceding July, it could be seriously injured by anything that might be averred by so vile a man as his former ally, Conover. A. S.

68. In the preparation for the publication of these Memoirs, I found myself continually lighting upon evidences of irregularity in the Government’s proceedings against Mr. Clay. I was met constantly by what appeared to be a persistent and inexplicable persecution of Messrs. Davis and Clay (if not a plot against them, as hinted by Representative Rogers) at the hands of the War Department, acting through Mr. Joseph Holt. I encountered charges, not ambiguously made against Mr. Holt, of malice, and of rancour which would be satisfied only with the “judicial murder” of the prisoners in his hands. Charges of malice and meanness have been made against him by living men as frequently as by those who have passed away; men, moreover, whose integrity of purpose has never been challenged. A rather general condemnation of Mr. Holt appears in certain correspondence of the sixties. It was uttered publicly in the press in the early and middle portion of that decade. In the pamphlet alluded to and quoted from in Chapter XXII. of these “Memoirs,” the Rev. Stuart Robinson had quoted Mr. Crittenden, of Kentucky, and another, to show the peculiar estimate in which Mr. Holt was then held. “I know little,” wrote Mr. Robinson, in June of ’5, “either of the personal or public character of Mr. Holt.... The only well-defined impression I have of his personal character is gained from two remarks concerning him in 1861–’2. The first, that of a venerable Christian lady, of the old-fashioned country type, made to me: ‘Joe Holt, Sir, is the only young man I ever knew that left this country without leaving one friend behind him in it!’ The other, the fierce retort of the venerable Crittenden, to a Cabinet officer, reported to me by Governor Morehead: ‘Joseph Holt, of Kentucky, did you say, Sir? I tell you, Sir, by Heaven! there is no such man as Joseph Holt, of Kentucky!’”

In addition to such contemporaneous public utterances concerning Mr. Holt, I have learned much that is corroborative by word of mouth from men whose opinions have been softened by time, and whose conspicuous positions in national affairs establish their utterances as both weighty and trustworthy. Said one of these, a United States Senator, within the year (1903), “Joseph Holt was the meanest man of his time. He was both unscrupulous and ambitious; and the smartest man I ever knew!”

Another as prominent in the nation’s affairs, said, using the same adjective as did the Senator just quoted, “He was a peculiarly mean man. I don’t know the true circumstances of Mr. Davis’s and Mr. Clay’s imprisonment, but the suspicions that attached to Holt were never proven, nor, so far as I know, investigated. After he went out of office he seemed to have no friends. He remained in Washington. I often saw him. Every morning he would get into a shabby old buggy and drive to market, where he would buy his meat and vegetables, potatoes, etc., for the day. These he would carry back to the house in his buggy, and his cook would prepare his solitary meals for him. I never felt anything but dislike for him,” said this gentleman, “and I don’t know any one else who did!”

“True!” responded another gentleman, whose word has balanced national opinion to a large extent for many years, “Mr. Holt was repugnant to me. I think he was generally regarded as a man who had forsaken his own section for gain. I thought him a heartless man. When he left office he went into utter obscurity!”

These remarks, coming from sources so authoritative, lent strength to the supposition that Mr. Holt’s behaviour toward his self-surrendered prisoner and former friend, Clement C. Clay, if it might be traced to its source, would, indeed, reveal a persecution at once vengeful and malicious, springing from some personal animus. For a year I made continuous effort to find this motive, but without success. Pitiless enmity, supported by almost unlimited powers (vested in Mr. Holt as Judge Advocate General, when the Government was in an unprecedented condition of chaos), this officer surely exercised toward Messrs. Davis and Clay; but, where was the raison d’Être?

By an accident, “at the eleventh hour,” the paper in Mr. Clay’s handwriting containing the sentence quoted in the preceding text came to light. I wrote promptly to Mrs. Clay-Clopton concerning it, urging her to try to recall, if possible, the “reasons” which Mr. Clay, in his prison in Fortress Monroe, on the night of December 29, 1865, had given her in explanation of Mr. Holt’s animosity toward him. Her reply ran as follows:

“I can give you, in regard of Mr. Holt’s persecution of my husband, one very important reason! On the breaking out of the war, I think on the secession of Mississippi, Holt, who had won both his fame and his fortune in that State of his adoption, espoused the Southern cause. Whether this was known to others than Mr. Davis and Mr. Clay, I do not know. From the impression that remains on my memory, Holt communicated in confidence to those two gentlemen alone his intention of standing by the South. Possibly, it was said to Mr. Davis alone, as the latter was Mississippi’s leading Senator, and by Mr. Davis repeated to Mr. Clay. It was a common thing in those days to keep secret one’s intentions.” [See visit of Admiral Semmes, Chapter IX.] “Whether Holt’s decision was known to others than Mr. Davis and Mr. Clay, his friend,” continues the letter, “I do not know. I remember Mr. Clay telling me that Mr. Holt was a renegade and a traitor, who had pledged himself to the South; but when, in his selfish ambition, he received a higher bid from the Federal Government, he deserted our cause and went over to the opposition. I do not recall the position offered Mr. Holt by the Federal Government, but it was a plum he coveted.

“You ask whether Mr. Clay and Mr. Holt ever had any dealings with each other, political or business:

“None of any kind! Mr. Clay only knew of Holt’s base defection from our cause and condemned him for it. My husband told me (in the Fortress), ‘Mr. Holt knows the estimate Mr. Davis and I have of his defection and would fain get us out of the way!’” A. S.

69. Governor Clay died the following autumn.

70. On the back of this scrap, Mr. Davis wrote in pencil, “If you get this, say I’ve got the tobacco and will give you a puff.” Long afterward, lest the identity of the little slip should be lost, Mr. Clay added this comment beneath the original inscription: “Preserve! Mr. Davis to me in prison! C. C. C.” A. S.

71. Mr. Harrison died in Washington, March 29, 1904. A. S.

72. Mr. Clay’s response to this letter is printed in Mayes’ “Life of Lamar.” (Page 122.)