Thursday, August 16, 2018

Samuel Gridley Howe to Horace Mann, Friday, January 24, 1851

Boston, Friday, 24th Jan’y, 1851.

My Dear Mann: — You will see by the papers that Sumner falls short four votes to-day of his yesterday's vote. I have been doing what I can, and have thrown aside the repugnance I had to being seen in the State House. I was astonished to find that save Downer's there was no energetic Free-soil pressure from without: within, our friends are like a flock of sheep without a shepherd.

I find that one of the Free-soil Whigs who is voting for Phillips is Rev. Mr. Wight of Wayland, father of our Miss W——, an excellent man and very conscientious, but whom Dr. Parkman and others had made to believe that Sumner was a very dangerous demagogue. I have laboured hard with him, and shall bring all the influence to bear upon him that I can. We will fight it out, but alas! it is almost a desperate game.

I wrote you a hasty line yesterday. I will write again to-morrow.

I have had a very heavy pressure of business — Annual Reports and others on my shoulders — but am getting free.

Ever yours,
S. G. Howe.

SOURCE: Laura E. Richards, Editor, Letters and Journals of Samuel Gridley Howe, Volume 2, p. 335-6

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