Senator John J. Crittenden to Albert T. Burnley, February 16, 1856*

WASHINGTON, 16, 1856.

MY DEAR BURNLEY,—Your several letters, of the 28th ult., and 8th and 11th of the present month, have been duly received, and I am much obliged by the full information they give of the subject to which they relate.

Our intercourse has been such for a long time past as to make you perfectly acquainted with my disposition and feeling in respect to a nomination to the Presidency, and in regard to the Presidency itself. There has been no reserve between us on the subject, and you know what my sentiments in relation to it have been and are.

That the Presidency is an office neither to be sought nor declined, is a sentiment that accords so well not only with my judgment, but with my natural temper and constitution, that I adopt and follow it rather from instinct than from any nobler or more patriotic consideration. It costs us no exertion to follow where our nature leads. I have never, therefore, put forward any pretensions to the Presidency, much less pressed them; nor have I ever endeavored, from any selfish feeling, to put back the claims or pretensions of any man. But, notwithstanding all this, I have a pride of character which does not permit me to humble myself so far as to shrink from or to decline even the Presidency itself, if such an honor and station should unexpectedly be offered me. But I am no candidate, no seeker for the office. I have said no word, taken no step in that direction. Nor will the nomination of another be any disappointment to me. I can willingly witness the nomination of another, and support that nomination, too. And of all the persons who have been named for that high office, I prefer our friend Davis. I would throw no obstacle in his way to a nomination, and would support that nomination with all the little power or influence I may have. I verily believe that Davis would do the same by me. And is not this all that could be required of either of us? I can say further, that if I could, by my word, close up all uncertainties of the future by accepting or making Davis the successor of Pierce, I would do it with an unalloyed feeling of gratification.

I do not think that Davis's friends ought to have sought in the Kentucky Convention for him any expression of preference over me. It is true that I had avowed no pretensions; but, like him, I had been spoken of for the same high office. Seniority, at least, was on my side; while more than willing to see Davis advanced, I might naturally feel some mortification at being passed by unnamed and as forgotten. His friends did not manage the thing well. Do not believe that any unkindness has been created in my mind by this proceeding. If Davis can get the nomination of the national convention I am content. I wish he would find some occasion to visit this part of the country, and especially Pennsylvania and New York. He has been long out of public life, and is not sufficiently known or appreciated there. He, I believe, is less favorably considered there than even I am. This is owing, in some degree, at least, to his being personally and politically less known. I think Davis has some peculiar claims on the American party, and I am sincerely anxious that he should be properly known and appreciated. You well know how to estimate what I say, because you know how little I care for myself in this matter, and how much I care for my friends in all matters. I am as willing as any to serve friends, but no surrendering must be required of me. But I must quit this subject. So far as concerns me, I have nothing to complain of the convention that lately met in Frankfort, or of its proceedings. Your course was such as became you, and you said nothing for me or in relation to me but what I approve. From my not writing to you you may infer, as the truth is, that I wrote to no one, attempted to influence no one, and took no part whatever in respect to the convention. Mr. Davis's friends and mine are to a great extent the same, and I hope they may remain so, and that no paltry jealousy will be allowed to produce any alienations.

I must close this letter. I wish you were coming here instead of going South. Many are the inquiries made about you, and many are they who would be delighted to see you here.

I am going out to dinner and the hour has come. I send you the copies which you request to be returned. I owe many letters to home folk, and I intend to pay them very soon.

Give my kindest regards and love to all.

Your friend,

J. J. CRITTENDEN,

A. T. BURNLEY, Esq.

_______________

* BLOG EDITOR’S NOTE: The original letter is dated “WASHINGTON, 16, 1856,” with the month omitted in the surviving transcription. The month can be identified as February from Crittenden’s reference to Burnley’s “several letters, of the 28th ult., and 8th and 11th of the present month.” The John J. Crittenden Papers at the Library of Congress identify Burnley’s corresponding letters as those of January 28, February 8, and February 11, 1856, making Crittenden’s letter February 16, 1856. See John J. Crittenden Papers, Library of Congress.

SOURCE: Ann Mary Butler Crittenden Coleman, Editor, The Life of John J. Crittenden: With Selections from His Correspondence and Speeches, Vol. 2, pp. 120-1

John H. McHenry* to Senator Robert M. T. Hunter, February 21, 1850

HARTFORD, KY., 21st February, 1850.

MY DEAR SIR: Perhaps you may almost have forgotten the individual who now addresses you, and who retains a vivid recollection of the many meetings and pleasant greetings he had with you when he had the honor of being an humble member of the committee of which you were chairman in the 29th Con[gress].

At the risk however of being entirely forgotten I have concluded to drop you a line if it be only to ascertain the fact.

Since we separated you have been busily engaged in the Senate of the U[nited] S[tates] aiding in the councils of our Nation, while I have been mostly engaged in the practice of the law riding over hills and vallies, swamps and waters as duty or necessity might require. Last year I was elected a delegate and took a part, an humble part, in forming a new constitution for my own native state. Except this I have been wholly disengaged from politics. I have been looking with deep solicitude at the course of events since I left Congress and have seen nothing to change the opinion which I expressed to you in a conversation during the pending of the three million bill or just before I do not now recollect which, "that the Mexican War was gotten up by the abolition raving of the then Cabinet to get a large scope of territory to make free States out of and to surround the slave States entirely to get back what they were pleased to term the balance of power which they said they had lost by giving up half of Oregon,” and advised you if possible to put a stop to the war before the rank and file got into the secret for if you did not the devil himself could not do it, that even Giddings and Culver would come in if they found out what it was for. You told me that you and your immediate friends were doing your best but were powerless, but if I would only keep Garrett Davis from throwing in his d----d resolutions of warning, which were calculated though not intended to bind the party together, that you thought you could possibly do something. I have often thought of this conversation and wondered if you had any recollection of it. Things that have occurred since have indelibly impressed it upon my memory.

In looking about for the causes of the Mexican war, I believed those assigned by the particular friends of the president were some of them insufficient and some of them unfounded and therefore I looked round for some reason to satisfy my own mind, and could find none but that. I named it to several of my friends and colleagues but could find none to agree with me. I formed the opinion first from reading Morey's instructions for raising Stephensons regiment. I thought the intention was to settle that regiment on the southern border of whatever land we might acquire and thus form the nucleus for a settlement from the free states immediately on our southern border and thus prevent a settlement from the slave states, by slave holders at least, within the bounds of the newly acquired territory. Upon due consideration of all that has happened since that time do you not now think that I at least guessed well if I did not form a correct opinion? In my canvass for delegate last summer I had to encounter emancipation in all its forms and triumphed over it. The leading men in this country are with the south but they are also for the Union and do not look to disunion as a remedy for any evil. They will "fight for slavery but die by the Union." As to the boys up the hollows and in the brush who form a considerable portion of our country they are not to [be] relied on in any contest against the Union. In a contest about the Union they would be willing to have the motto of the first soldiers of the revolution "Liberty or death"—but in a contest about slavery they would be a good deal like one Barney Decker who was about to have a soldiers badge and motto made and when the lady who made the badge asked him if he would have the same motto hesitated and then replied "You may put ‘liberty or be crippled.’” I am afraid the boys will say "slavery or be crippled." For God's sake try and settle all these questions of slavery if possible and let us not dissolve the Union.

But if we have to write like Francis the 1st to his mother, "Madam all's lost but honor" let us do it with this and we will have the approval of our own conscience without which a man is nothing.

_______________

* A Representative in Congress from Kentucky, 1845-1847.

SOURCE: Charles Henry Ambler, Editor, Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1916, in Two Volumes, Vol. II, Correspondence of Robert M. T. Hunter (1826-1876), p. 104-6

Diary of Lieutenant-Colonel Rutherford B. Hayes: Friday, July 18, 1862

Camp Green Meadows. — Rained last night and drizzled all this morning. . . . I feel dourish today; inaction is taking the soul out of us.

I am really jolly over the Rebel Morgan's raid into the bluegrass region of Kentucky. If it turns out a mere raid, as I suppose it will, the thing will do great good. The twitter into which it throws Cincinnati and Ohio will aid us in getting volunteers. The burning and destroying the property of the old-fashioned, conservative Kentuckians will wake them up, will stiffen their sinews, give them backbone, and make grittier Union men of them. If they should burn Garrett Davis’ house, he will be sounder on confiscation and the like. In short, if it does not amount to an uprising, it will be a godsend to the Union cause. It has done good in Cincinnati already. It has committed numbers who were sliding into Secesh to the true side. Good for Morgan, as I understand the facts at this writing!

Had a good drill. The exercise and excitement drove away the blues. After drill a fine concert of the glee club of Company A. As they sang “That Good Old Word, Good-bye,” I thought of the pleasant circle that used to sing it on Gulf Prairie, Brazoria County, Texas. And now so broken! And my classmate and friend, Guy M. Bryan — where is he? In the Rebel army! As honorable and true as ever, but a Rebel! What strange and sad things this war produces! But he is true and patriotic wherever he is. Success to him personally!

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 306