Diary of 2nd Lieutenant John S. Morgan, Friday, March 24, 1865

Fatigue party goes out at 5. a. m. to unload boats. spend A. M. going to the Commissary for grub, and writing. P. M. go with Lt Loughridge to camp of 8th Iowa, while there this Regt rec's orders to be ready to march at daylight tomorrow morning with 4 days rations in their haver sacks. Genl Smiths whole corps rec's the same orders. We see post of the line of breastworks about this camp, which are good & strong & 9 miles in extent, seems as though these things come by magic, they rise so quick. Genl Veachs Div gets in this P. М.; After dark the train comes in, there is a big shout when the train crosses the pontoons. They lost by bushrangers 14 men drivers. & as many mules Lt Loughridge & I were out after Tattoo to learn the cause of the cheering when the train was coming in, & hear some sweet music in another Regt. Word in camp that in a skirmish 3 miles from camp this P. M. several men were wounded. 2 ambulance loads said to have come in.

SOURCE: “Diary of John S. Morgan, Company G, Thirty-Third Iowa Infantry,” Annals of Iowa, Vol. XIII, No. 8, Third Series, Des Moines, April 1923, pp. 579-80

Diary of Dr. Alfred L. Castleman, January 1, 1862

A great day of sport to usher in the new year. Amongst other amusements in our army, Hancock's Brigade "got up a time on its own hook." At twelve o'clock I went into the parade ground, and found about 10,000 people, soldiers and civilians, collected to witness the sport. Hancock's Brigade is composed of the 5th Wisconsin, 6th Maine, 43d New York, and 49th Pennsylvania Volunteers. The sport commenced by a foot race of one thousand yards, purse $20 for the first out, $10 for second. About twenty started. The 5th Wisconsin took both prizes. Then jumping three jumps, prize $15, won by a member of the 5th Wisconsin. Next, climbing a greased pole, first prize won by a member of 6th Maine. Second, by 5th Wisconsin. Next, a greased pig (a two hundred-pounder) with a face as long as the moral law, or as a "speech in Congress, shorn of his hair, the knot which had been tied in his tail to prevent his crawling through fence cracks, was untied, and his whole skin thoroughly "greased" with soft soap, was turned loose, with the announcement, "get what you can, and hold what you get." The holder was to have the pig and ten dollars. For this prize, there were about four thousand competitors. The word was given, and the "Grand Army of the Potomac" was at last on the move. This chase commenced a little before sun-set. Pig had one hundred yards the start. One fellow far outran all the rest, and as he drew close on to his game, piggy suddenly turned on him with a "booh," and the fellow ran t'other way as if he had seen a rebel. The whole crowd came rushing on piggy, expecting him to run; but piggy stood his ground and said "booh!" "The front line" suddenly brought a halt. But the rear, not prepared for so sudden a check, pressed forward, and the whole came down in a heap. A scream of "murder." Piggy answered "booh." At every "booh" a "line was swept away." The pile of humanity became impassable. Those in the rear, filed to right and left, and by a "flank movement" took piggy in the rear. And now came a hand to hand encounter. As the last streak of the expiring day shed its light upon the excited combatants, it revealed a living mass of four thousand people—and a pig; the pig crowning the heap at the moment when the ray withdrew its light. Night was then made hideous by the screams of murder and replies of "booh." Neither party could distinguish friend from foe; and as I retire for rest, the combat still rages. I do not permit myself to doubt, however, that the morning will bring us the news of "another great victory by the grand army of the Potomac."*

At twelve o'clock last night, just as the old year was being crowded out of existence to make room for the new, I was awoke by a gentle thumbing of a guitar. 'Twas right at the door of my tent. In a moment commenced at the other end of the tent, the soft, sweet notes of a violin; then, from all sides came up, low, soft, sweet sounds, as ever a band of small instruments poured forth. The music stopped for awhile, and a voice asked, "Shall we now strike up with the band?" "No! no! No drum, nor fife, nor horn; — they will disturb the sick, and he will not like that!!" Could a more delicate compliment than was conveyed in this remark have been devised by a soldiery whose business is pomp and noisy war? "He won't like it—it will disturb his patients." I appreciated this. It struck a cord which vibrated in unison with my pride, my vanity, my ambition. I of course acknowledged it; and so deeply felt the compliment that I record it, as worthy of my remembrance. "The hospital boys" got up a handsome supper to-night, at which the Surgeons were guests. It was a very pretty supper, and to me a pleasant affair.

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* Notice that in this athletic contest for prizes, three Eastern and one Northwestern Regiment engaged; all the prizes save one (climbing the pole, which was taken by a Maine sailor) were carried off by the one Western Regiment.

 

SOURCE: Alfred L. Castleman, The Army of the Potomac. Behind the Scenes. A Diary of Unwritten History; From the Organization of the Army, by General George B. McClellan, to the close of the Campaign in Virginia about the First Day January, 1863, pp. 70-2

Diary of 2nd Lieutenant Benjamin F. Pearson, January 10, 1863

Forenoon I rambled down the bottom & through a cotton plantation & to a burning cotton gin & back to camp afternoon MH Hare our Chaplain & I rode out some 2½ or 3 miles was to see the Kansas 5th Cavelry we viewed some fine plantations went to a cotton gin & I got a sack of seed to send to Iowa, we returned & I was on Dress perade. the afternoon & night is echoing with the clatter of buisey men preparing & moving by Companies & Regiments, Cavalry & Infantry & Artillery & going on board of the fleet of steamers here, the tramp of man & beasts the ratling of wagons the hollowing of teamsters men & officers, the musick of the buglers, the fifes & drums, & the hoarse cough of the steamers with their keen shrill whistle makes the atmosphere in this valley tremble with the mingled sounds & reverberate along the hills

SOURCE: Edgar R. Harlan, Currator, Annals of Iowa, 3rd Series, Vol. 15, No. 2, October 1925, pp. 103-4

Diary of Lieutenant-Colonel John Beatty, October 6, 1861

The Third and Sixth Ohio, with Loomis' battery, left camp at half-past three in the afternoon, and took the Huntersville turnpike for Big Springs, where Lee's army has been encamped for some months. At nine o'clock we reached Logan's Mill, where the column halted for the night. It had rained heavily for some hours, and was still raining. The boys went into camp thoroughly wet, and very hungry and tired; but they soon had a hundred fires kindled, and, gathering around these, prepared and ate supper.

I never looked upon a wilder or more interesting scene. The valley is blazing with camp-fires; the men flit around them like shadows. Now some indomitable spirit, determined that neither rain nor weather shall get him down, strikes up:

Oh! say, can you see by the dawn's early light,

What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming,

Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight,

O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming?

A hundred voices join in, and the very mountains, which loom up in the fire-light like great walls, whose tops are lost in the darkness, resound with a rude melody befiting so wild a night and so wild a scene. But the songs are not all patriotic. Love and fun make contribution also, and a voice, which may be that of the invincible Irishman, Corporal Casey, sings:

’T was a windy night, about two o'clock in the morning,

 An Irish lad, so tight, all the wind and weather scorning,

 At Judy Callaghan's door, sitting upon the paling,

 His love tale he did pour, and this is part of his wailing:

 Only say you'll be mistress Brallaghan;

 Don't say nay, charming Judy Callaghan.

A score of voices pick up the chorus, and the hills and mountains seem to join in the Corporal's appeal to the charming Judy:

Only say you'll be mistress Brallaghan;

Don't say nay, charming Judy Callaghan.

Lieutenant Root is in command of Loomis' battery. Just before reaching Logan's one of his provision wagons tumbled down a precipice, severely injuring three men and breaking the wagon in pieces.

SOURCE: John Beatty, The Citizen-soldier: Or, Memoirs of a Volunteer, pp. 75-7

Diary of Lieutenant-Colonel John Beatty, October 8, 1861

Resumed the march early, found the river waist high, and current swift; but the men all got over safely, and we reached camp at one o'clock.

The Third has been assigned to a new brigade, to be commanded by Brigadier-General Dumont, of Indiana.

The paymaster has come at last.

Willis, my new servant, is a colored gentleman of much experience and varied accomplishments. He has been a barber on a Mississippi river steamboat, and a daguerreian artist. He knows much of the South, and manipulates a fiddle with wonderful skill. He is enlivening the hours now with his violin.

Oblivious to rain, mud, and the monotony of the camp, my thoughts are carried by the music to other and pleasanter scenes; to the cottage home, to wife and children, to a time still further away when we had no children, when we were making the preliminary arrangements for starting in the world together, when her cheeks were ruddier than now, when wealth and fame and happiness seemed lying just before me, ready to be gathered in, and farther away still, to a gentle, blue-eyed mother—now long gone—teaching her child to lisp his first simple prayer.

SOURCE: John Beatty, The Citizen-soldier: Or, Memoirs of a Volunteer, pp. 77-8

Diary of Lieutenant-Colonel John Beatty, October 10, 1861

Mr. Strong, the chaplain, has a prayer meeting in the adjoining tent. His prayers and exhortations fill me with an almost irresistible inclination to close my eyes and shut out the vanities, cares, and vexations of the world. Parson Strong is dull, but he is very industrious, and on secular days devotes his physical and mental powers to the work of tanning three sheepskins and a calf's hide. On every fair day he has the skins strung on a pole before his tent to get the sun. He combs the wool to get it clean, and takes especial delight in rubbing the hides to make them soft and pliable. I told the parson the other day that I could not have the utmost confidence in a shepherd who took so much pleasure in tanning hides.

While Parson Strong and a devoted few are singing the songs of Zion, the boys are having cotillion parties in other parts of the camp. On the parade ground of one company Willis is officiating as — musician, and the gentlemen go through "honors to partners" and "circle all" with apparently as much pleasure as if their partners had pink cheeks, white slippers, and dresses looped up with rosettes.

There comes from the Chaplain's tent a sweet and solemn refrain:

Perhaps He will admit my plea,

Perhaps will hear my prayer;

But if I perish I will pray,

And perish only there.

I can but perish if I go.

I am resolved to try,

For if I stay away I know

I must forever die.

While these old hymns are sounding in our ears, we are almost tempted to go, even if we do perish. Surely nothing has such power to make us forget earth and its round of troubles as these sweet old church songs, familiar from earliest childhood, and wrought into the most tender memories, until we come to regard them as a sort of sacred stream, on which some day our souls will float away happily to the better country.

SOURCE: John Beatty, The Citizen-soldier: Or, Memoirs of a Volunteer, pp. 79-81

Diary of Lieutenant-Colonel John Beatty, October 12, 1861

The parson is in my tent doing his best to extract something solemn out of Willis' violin. Now he stumbles on a strain of "Sweet Home," then a scratch of "Lang Syne;" but the latter soon breaks its neck over "Old Hundred," and all three tunes finally mix up and merge into "I would not live alway, I ask not to stay," which, for the purpose of steadying his hand, the parson sings aloud. I look at him and affect surprise that a reverend gentleman should take any pleasure in so vain and wicked an instrument, and express a hope that the business of tanning skins has not utterly demoralized him.

Willis pretends to a taste in music far superior to that of the common "nigger." He plays a very fine thing, and when I ask what it is, replies: "Norma, an opera piece." Since the parson's exit he has been executing "Norma" with great spirit, and, so far as I am able to judge, with wonderful skill. I doubt not his thoughts are a thousand miles hence, among brownskinned wenches, dressed in crimson robes, and decorated with ponderous ear-drops. In fact, "Norma” is good, and goes far to carry one out of the wilderness.

SOURCE: John Beatty, The Citizen-soldier: Or, Memoirs of a Volunteer, p. 81

Diary of 5th Sergeant Lawrence Van Alstyne: December 26, 1862

Leroy was buried early this morning. My part in it was to form the company and march it by the left flank to the grave. For fear this may not be plain I will add, that the captain and orderly are always at the right of the line when the company is in line for any purpose and that end of the line is the right flank. The tallest men are on the right also and so on down to the shortest, which is Will Hamilton and Charles Tweedy, who are on the left, or the left flank as it is called. This arrangement brings the officers in the rear going to the grave, but when all is over the captain takes command and marches the company back by the right. I got through without a break and feel as if I was an old soldier instead of a new one. But it is a solemn affair. Leroy was a favorite with us and his death and this, our first military funeral, has had a quieting effect on all. Last night the chaplain and some officers, good singers all, came in and we almost raised the roof singing patriotic songs. Speeches were made and we ended up with three cheers that must have waked the alligators out in the swamp. Sweet potatoes and other things are beginning to come in and as they sell for most nothing we are living high. But we are in bad shape as a whole. Mumps have appeared and twenty-four new cases were found to-day. Colonel Smith, our lieutenant-colonel, has been up the river to try and find out if better quarters could not be had and has not succeeded. He is mad clear through, and when asked where we were to go, said to hell, for all he could find out.

SOURCE:  Lawrence Van Alstyne, Diary of an Enlisted Man, pp. 76-7

Diary of Horatio Nelson Taft, Sunday, March 16, 1862

Has not rained today. A Reg^t passed this morning with Band playing &c just as people were going to church. Co^l Dutton had his horse sent down and he left for the Camp (as he said) cured. Co^l Durkee left early this morning. Co^l Dutton had an ambrotype of his family, self, wife & five children. I noticed that he was very attentive to it this morning. We think him a very fine warm hearted man. It is probable that he will be called into active service very soon. Maj M^cCamby of Oswego and Q Master Francis of Bridghampton LI called today, they belong to the 81 NY Reg^t.

SOURCE: Horatio Nelson Taft, The Diary of Horatio Nelson Taft, 1861-1865. Volume 1, January 1,1861-April 11, 1862, Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, Washington D. C.

Diary of Horatio Nelson Taft, Monday, March 17, 1862

Nothing new has transpired today that we know of. The Telegraph announces that a Battle is in progress on the Miss. Com Foote is Bombarding the Rebels at Island N^o 10 with his gun boats. Troops are embarking on the Steam Boats to go down the River. The long trains of Gov^t Wagons which used to obstruct our Streets have nearly all left, and are over the River having followed the Army. I called down to Mr Morrisons on D st this evening for Julia. It is now 10½ o'clock, the children are all in bed since ½ past 8. A fine Band of music is playing in the street, some Seranade I presume.

SOURCE: Horatio Nelson Taft, The Diary of Horatio Nelson Taft, 1861-1865. Volume 1, January 1,1861-April 11, 1862, Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, Washington D. C.

Diary of Private Ephraim Shelby Dodd, Friday, April 3, 1863

I went out piruting this evening, came back to Camp and went in to Dr. Moore's, sit till bed time. Miss Nannie made some music for me; the evening passed pleasantly.

SOURCE: Ephraim Shelby Dodd, Diary of Ephraim Shelby Dodd: Member of Company D Terry's Texas Rangers, p. 11

Diary of Private Lewis C. Paxson: Thursday, December 11, 1862

Very pleasant. Smith's singing school.

SOURCE: Lewis C. Paxson, Diary of Lewis C. Paxson: Stockton, N.J., 1862-1865, p. 9

Diary of Private Lewis C. Paxson: Friday, December 12, 1862

I went to singing school. Organized a post lyceum, Capt. Rolla Banks, president. Question for next week: "Are Mankind Advancing Toward Perfection?" Affirmative: Wright, Marsh and Buck; negative: Kinney, Paxson and Brown.

SOURCE: Lewis C. Paxson, Diary of Lewis C. Paxson: Stockton, N.J., 1862-1865, p. 9

Diary of Lieutenant-Colonel John Beatty, September 23, 1861

This afternoon I rode by a mountain path to a log cabin in which a half dozen wounded Tennesseeans are lying. One poor fellow had his leg amputated yesterday, and was very feeble. One had been struck by a ball on the head and a buckshot in the lungs. Two boys were but slightly wounded, and were in good spirits. To one of these-a jovial, pleasant boy—Dr. Seyes said, good humoredly: "You need have no fears of dying from a gunshot; you are too big a devil, and were born to be hung." Colonel Marrow sought to question this same fellow in regard to the strength of the enemy, when the boy said: "Are you a commissioned officer?" "Yes," replied Marrow. "Then," returned he," you ought to know that a private soldier don't know anything."

In returning to camp, we followed a path which led to a place where a regiment of the rebels had encamped one night. They had evidently become panic-stricken and left in hot haste. The woods were strewn with knapsacks, blankets, and canteens.

The ride was a pleasant one. The path, first wild and rugged, finally led to a charming little valley, through which Beckey's creek hurries down to the river. Leaving this, we traveled up the side of a ravine, through which a little stream fretted and fumed, and dashed into spray against slimy rocks, and then gathered itself up for another charge, and so pushed gallantly on toward the valley and the sunshine.

What a glorious scene! The sky filled with stars; the rising moon; two mountain walls so high, apparently, that one might step from them into heaven; the rapid river, the thousand white tents dotting the valley, the camp fires, the shadowy forms of soldiers; in short, just enough of heaven and earth visible to put one's fancy on the gallop. The boys are in groups about their fires. The voice of the troubadour is heard. It is a pleasant song that he sings, and I catch part of it.

"The minstrel 's returned from the war,

      With spirits as buoyant as air,

 And thus on the tuneful guitar

      He sings in the bower of the fair:

 The noise of the battle is over;

     The bugle no more calls to arms;

A soldier no more, but a lover,

     I kneel to the power of thy charms.

Sweet lady, dear lady, I'm thine;

     I bend to the magic of beauty,

Though the banner and helmet are mine,

     Yet love calls the soldier to duty."

SOURCE: John Beatty, The Citizen-soldier: Or, Memoirs of a Volunteer, pp. 68-9

Diary of Private Ephraim Shelby Dodd: Tuesday, March 17, 1863

I listened to some delightful music this morning by Miss Stern, particularly the Texas Rangers, dedicated to Mrs. Gen'l Wharton. I started back to Camp but met the Regiment going out on picket. I fell in and went out and had to come back or go back and get my blankets. Came out half a mile from D. and camped.

SOURCE: Ephraim Shelby Dodd, Diary of Ephraim Shelby Dodd: Member of Company D Terry's Texas Rangers, p. 10

Grand Instrumental Concert at Metropolitan Hall.

Among the most welcome of those who have come among us, drawn by the present political Convention, we are gratified to see and recognize the celebrated Gilmore’s Band, which has accompanied the Massachusetts Republicans to the West. As a musical organization, this band takes rank even with the famous “Dodsworth” of New York, and their concert this evening will be a rich treat to those of our people who have the love of music in the souls. Their repertore [sic] contains all the best arrangements of the higher grades of instrumental music, and their programme for this evening presents a selection of gems which make it sparkle with beauty. The house, we have no doubt, will be crowded, and we recommend an early application for tickets, which can be had at the hotels and principal music stores.

SOURCE: “Grand Instrumental Concert at Metropolitan Hall,” The Press and Tribune, Chicago, Illinois, Wednesday, May 16, 1860, p. 4, col. 5

Musical Union Concert.

The greatest musical treat of the season comes off this evening at Metropolitan Hall. The “Musical Union,” which recently gave the “Haymakers” with so much success in this city, is again out with a rich programme, embracing some of the choicest gems of song. Among the prominent performers on this occasion, we notice the names of Mrs. THOMAS, one of our best Sopranos; Mrs. Mattison, the finest Contralto in the Northwest; De Passio, whose Baritone is not excelled, and well-known  and popular Basso, J. G. Lumbard, and H. Johnson, which, together with the choral strength of the Society, and the orchestra of the Light Guard Band, the whole under the direction of J. G. Gird, conductor, make up an entertainment rarely equaled in musical efforts.

SOURCE: “Musical Union Concert,” The Press and Tribune, Chicago, Illinois, Tuesday, May 15, 1860, p. 4, col. 2

Diary of George Templeton Strong: Monday, February 6, 1860

Just from opera, Puritani, with Ellie and Mrs. Georgey Peters and Dr. Carroll. Little Patti, the new prima donna, made a brilliant success.³ Her voice is fresh, but wants volume and expression as yet; vocalization perfect. . . .

Columbia College meeting at two p.m. Resolved to appropriate the President’s house and Professor Joy’s to College purposes, turn them into lecture rooms, and so forth. A good move. It is contemplated to build a new house for the President on Forty-ninth Street, which I think questionable.

I brought up some matters connected with the Law School, which went to the appropriate committee, and instigated King to introduce the question of suppressing-these secret societies, which do immense mischief in all our colleges. John Weeks has just taken a young brother of his from Columbia College and sent him into the country, because he found that the youth belonged to some mystic association designated by two Greek letters which maintained a sort of club room over a Broadway grocery store, with billiard tables and a bar. Whether it be possible to suppress them is another question. Result was that King is instructed to correspond with the authorities of other colleges and see whether any suggestions can be got from them and whether anything can be done by concerted action. . .⁴

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³ Adelina Patti, now about to enter her eighteenth year, had made her operatic debut in New York in 1859.

⁴ Fraternities were well planted at Columbia. Alpha Delta Phi had been chartered there in 1836, and three other fraternity chapters had been organized in the 1840’s. Francis Henry Weeks took his degree at Williams College in 1864.

SOURCE: Allan Nevins and Milton Halset Thomas, Editors, Diary of George Templeton Strong, Vol. 3, p. 6-7

Diary of George Templeton Strong: February 10, 1860

Opera tonight with Ellie and Mrs. Georgey Peters and her papa; Der Freischutz in an Italian version. The Germanism of that opera is so intense that any translation of its text is an injustice to Weber’s memory, but its noble music can afford to be heard under disadvantages. Max was Stigelli, and very good. Agatha (Colson) was respectable. She knew how her music ought to be sung and tried hard, but had not the vigor it demands. Caspar (Junca) was pretty bad.

Query: if there ever existed a Caspar who could sing “Hier in diesem Jammerthal” as it ought to be sung, or an Agatha who could do justice to the glorious allegro that follows her “leise, leise, fromme Weise”? I enjoyed the evening, also Wednesday evening, when we had Charley Strong and wife in “our box’’ and heard The Barber, delightfully rendered. Little Patti made a most brilliant Rosina and sang a couple of English songs in the “Music Lesson’’ scene, one of them (“Coming through the Rye’’) simply and with much archness and expression. This little debutante is like to have a great career and to create a furor in Paris and St. Petersburg within five years. . . .

Last night I attended W. Curtis Noyes’s first lecture before the Law School of Columbia College.⁵ It was carefully prepared, and (to my great relief) honored by an amply sufficient audience. The lecture room was densely filled, and Oscanyan told me sixty or seventy were turned away. We may have to resort to the Historical Society lecture room (in Second Avenue).

There is much less talking of politics now that a Speaker is elected.

I think a cohesive feeling of nationality and Unionism gains strength silently both North and South, and that the Republican party has lost and is daily losing many of the moderate men who were forced into it four years ago by the Kansas outrages and the assault on Sumner. If the South would spare us its brag and its bad rhetoric, it would paralyze any Northern free-soil party in three weeks. But while Toombs speechifies and Governor Wise writes letters, it’s hard for any Northern man to keep himself from Abolitionism and refrain from buying a photograph of John Brown.

Southern chivalry is a most curious and instructive instance of the perversion of a word from its original meaning; lucus a non lucendo seems a plausible derivation when one hears that word applied to usages and habits of thought and action so precisely contrary to all it expressed some five hundred years ago. Chivalry in Virginia and Georgia means violence to one man by a mob of fifty calling itself a Vigilance Committee, ordering a Yankee school mistress out of the state because she is heterodox about slavery, shooting a wounded prisoner, assailing a non-combatant like Sumner with a big bludgeon and beating him nearly to death. Froissart would have recognized the Flemish boor or the mechanic of Ghent in such doings. Sir Galahad and Sir Lancelot in the Morte d’Arthur would have called them base, felon, dishonorable, shameful, and foul.

Burke announced sixty years ago that "the age of chivalry” was gone, and "that of calculators and economists had succeeded it.” Their period has likewise passed away now, south of the Potomac, and has been followed by a truculent mob despotism that sustains itself by a system of the meanest eavesdropping and espionage and of utter disregard of the rights of those who have not the physical power to defend themselves against overwhelming odds, that shoots or hangs its enemy or rides him on a rail when it is one hundred men against one and lets him alone when evenly matched, and is utterly without mercy for the weak or generosity for the vanquished. This course of practice must be expected of any mere mob when rampant and frightened, but the absurdity is that they call it “chivalry.” There was something truly chivalric in old John Brown’s march with his handful of followers into the enemy’s country to redeem and save those he held to be unjustly enslaved at peril of his own life. For that enterprise he was hanged, justly and lawfully, but there was in it an element of chivalry, genuine though mistaken, and criminal because mistaken, that is nat to be found in the performances of these valiant vigilance committeemen.

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⁵ William Curtis Noyes (1805—1864), one of the foremost New York lawyers, and owner of a magnificent law library, had distinguished himself in numerous cases; notably in the prosecution of the Wall Street forger Huntington, and in protecting the New Haven Railroad stockholders from the consequences of Schuyler’s embezzlement.

SOURCE: Allan Nevins and Milton Halset Thomas, Editors, Diary of George Templeton Strong, Vol. 3, p. 7-9

Diary of George Templeton Strong: February 29, 1860

Went alone to Philharmonic rehearsal at Academy of Music. Watched Hazeltine and pretty Helen Lane billing and cooing just in front of me to the very appropriate accompaniment of Beethoven’s lovely D Symphony. A sentimental gent would say that the handsome young couple and the glowing joyous music of that brightest of all Beethoven’s greater works were each a sort of commentary on the other. Then I went to 24 Union Square and saw Mr. Buggies, who left Lockport Monday, spent a day at Albany, and reached New York this morning. I paid him another visit this evening. He has convalesced rapidly and looks better than I expected to see him. I feared this perilous illness might have left him with energies impaired and faculties blunted, but he is quite himself, full of life and vigorous thought. He is not without his hobby, namely: there is, or seems to be, a political reaction against sectionalism, John Brownism, Higher Lawism, and the like. This is, therefore, a good opportunity to assert the claims of the church as a conservative law-loving institution against Calvinism and the ultra Protestant notions it has produced; to tell Union men throughout the country that they belong in the church; to define the limits of authority and private judgment in political ethics. A clear statement of all this might effect a great deal just at this time and would come with a certain authority from the committee appointed by the last general convention of which Mr. Ruggles is chairman.

Monday, Jem and George Anthon dined here, and we heard Martha, which is a very pretty opera. Last night I attended Noyes’s second lecture before the Law School; crowded, like the first. That people should go away from a law lecture in New York for want of seats is without precedent. This school is the only one of our seeds of post-graduate instruction that survives and grows, our only university nucleus. If Betts and Ogden were less hopelessly inert, it might be developed into usefulness on a large scale.

SOURCE: Allan Nevins and Milton Halset Thomas, Editors, Diary of George Templeton Strong, Vol. 3, p. 11-12