Thomas Wentworth Higginson to Louisa Storrow Higginson, June 26, 1856

Worcester, June 26,1856

I have a momentary lull, having yesterday sent off my second party to Kansas. . . . The first had forty-seven and our Committee will send no more, leaving it for the State Committee, which was appointed yesterday, chiefly on my urging. . . .

At Chicago they show an energy which disgraces us; have arrangements and men already and need only money. The night I came from Brattleboro', Friday, we had letters from Chicago, and our Finance Committee voted them fifteen hundred dollars and voted to add three thousand dollars more, unless I could raise this second party by Wednesday, which I did. Saturday, the day after, I was sent to Boston, with the same letters, to urge the Boston Committee to send money to Chicago. With great difficulty I got five minutes each from Pat Jackson and several other merchants, and at two they came together for ten minutes and voted to send two thousand dollars, Ingersoll Bowditch being happily absent, who had just told me he should come and oppose it entirely. I saw the telegraphic despatch written and came back.

That very night we got a telegraphic despatch from Chicago, imploring us to send that precise sum, for the relief of a large party of emigrants, detained at Iowa City for want of means. The two despatches crossed on the way.

This two thousand dollars, with our remittance, and our two parties of emigrants (which would not have gone till by this time if I had not gone to work on it the first night I came) are absolutely All that has yet been done by New England for Kansas, in this time of imminent need. This I say to show you how ill-prepared we are for such emergencies. The busy give no time and the leisurely no energy, and there is no organization. I should except the Committee here, which has done admirably, and that in Concord, Massachusetts, and Dr. Howe, Sam Cabot, Charles Higginson, and a few others in Boston.

There is talk now of sending Dr. Howe to Kansas with a large sum of money, and this will be the best thing possible, but it should have been done a fortnight ago.

SOURCE: Mary Potter Thacher Higginson, Editor, Letters and Journals of Thomas Wentworth Higginson, 1846-1906, p. 137-9

Amos A. Lawrence to Major James B. Abbott, August 20, 1855

This instalment of carbines is far from being enough, and I hope the measures you are taking will be followed up until every organized company of trusty men in the Territory shall be supplied. Dr. Cahot¹ will give me the names of any gentlemen here who subscribe money, and the amount, of which I shall keep a memorandum, and promise them that it shall be repaid, either in cash or rifles, whenever it is settled that Kansas shall not be a province of Missouri. Therefore keep them in capital order, and, above all, take good care that they do not fall into the hands of the Missourians after you once get them into use. You must dispose of these where they will do the most good; and for this purpose you should advise with Dr. Robinson and Mr. Pomeroy.²

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¹ Samuel Cabot, Jr., M.D., a noted surgeon in Boston, and one of the most active in raising money for rifles and other material aid to the Kansas farmers in 1855-57. He has preserved a list of the subscribers to the arms fund, which the historian of Kansas should print in his volume.

² In view of these manly letters of Mr. Lawrence, his statements to the Massachusetts Historical Society (May 8, 1884) in praise of the peaceful character of Charles Robinson are very grotesque. Mr. Lawrence then said: “Charles Robinson never bore arms, nor omitted to do whatever he considered to be his duty. Be sternly held the people to their loyalty to the Government, against the arguments and the example of the ‘higher law’ men, who were always armed.” One of these “higher law” men was Major Abbott, who rescued Branson contrary to law, and who was armed by Mr. Lawrence himself, at the urgent request of Robinson! Sad is the effect of time on the human memory.

SOURCE: Franklin B. Sanborn, The Life and Letters of John Brown, p. 213