We have before us in Massachusetts a very bitter period of political strife, to last till the Presidential election. After that the Free Soil cause will be completely and without let or hindrance in the ascendant. I know public sentiment here, and I do not for a moment doubt the future and their associates will probably share the fate of the Hartford conventionists. I hope Hillard may be saved.
SOURCE: Edward L. Pierce, Memoir and Letters of Charles Sumner, Vol. 3, p. 253
Having had an acquaintance with your father and formed an attachment to him for the noble and generous principles held by him, I have felt the same attachment for the Worth family and, as you know, have supported them on all occasions. I have been, it seems from my feelings, for some days compelled to pen some thoughts to you that you may know my feelings and anxiety for the preservation of this Union which feels so dear to me. My father and three uncles fought for it, two of whom lost their lives; is there any amongst us who has lost more ancestry blood than myself; then dear friend think it not strange if I entreat you to save the ship, save the ship, save the ship or let not the noble County of Randolph stain her hand in its loss—was not there once a nullification spirit gotten up at the North? Remember the Hartford Convention and how President Monroe treated the commushingers1 sent to him from it, gentlemen I can not receive you only as privet citizens, rather than see him in this capacity they sneak off home, whoted and made fun of in every town through which they passed—the people did not follow there leaders but it seames flew to armes and made peace—by the Vermonters in the affere of Plattsburg and that of Stonington, what next we here that a man by the name of Cooper was sent over to Columbia, South Carolina, as a leader in their College to fill the young students' minds with the seed and doctrine of nullification, which was soon done, and South Carolina nullified and kindled the sire to bust the Union, but it failed. The digest of South Carolina (says a writer) reclaims the name and titles of the King, and his officers so arranged that an uninformed reader from that work would not determine whether she was a state of the Union or a British Province. Hence the old seed of Toryism as a foundation for Nullification Cecession and a combustible to take fire and explode in the land the end at which she has aimed for forty years is at last accomplished; and what has she done, she has filled the country with jealousy, war armies, expenses, murder, rapine with all the horrors concomitant on war—and then Eve-like casts the blame on the North and Old Lincoln—but worse than this, several of the States are now assisting her to fan the flames and consume this once happy country, contrary to Washington's advice and councile, which was to exhume any man an enemy who should mention or intimate a wish to split or divide the Union, observing united we stand, divided we fall. I had an interview with an old man 77 years old the other day near South Caroliny he said his father was born in Virginia come to S. C. and married before the Revolution but in the time of the war the Tories were so bad he had to go back to Virginia and stay til peace was made. Can it be possible that the good and once virtuous people of these Southern States will choose this tyrannical state for their leader? O yes, she has become changed and virtuous enough to be our leader and will lead us on to conquest and to glory but I hope you will use your influence to save the ship—slay not your noble principles bus plead that we follow the example of Kentucky and Tennessee. The treachery of man in the heart and bowels of our country has been very great. O my God, what is to come! Do thou protect the ship: bring to naught the wicked council of the ungodly.
Now dear friend as I have been in the habit of looking up to you for advice but we have falling on strange times it seems. Saton has turned loose, IIaving great power and authority and has filled the earth full of lies from one end to the other: and fear has taken hold on me so that I know not what to do I fear there are unprincipal men enough to take the lives of men already have been called an old abolitionist—what next.
P. S. I have hoped that the good sense and virtue of the people would save the ship from the rocks, by the superintending Providence of God but it seems gon. O that the American people had cultivated the publick mind, taken good heed to themselves and their Country, we are a ruined people, ruined ruined, what a change. I have written a few unconnected thoughts thinking you are better able to understand than myself and will do your duty. Farewell now to farewell in time and in eternity is to do well.
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SOURCE: J. G. de Roulhac Hamilton, Editor, The Correspondence of Jonathan Worth, Volume 1, p. 138-40
