Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 6: A series of pen and pencil sketches of the lives of more than 200 of the most prominent personages in History
History
Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 6: A series of pen and pencil sketches of the lives of more than 200 of the most prominent personages in History
Biography
The renomination of Lincoln for a second term, in 1864, developed a
breach in the ranks of the old abolitionists, Mr. Garrison and his
adherents supporting Lincoln, and others, under the lead of Wendell
Phillips, advocating the choice of General Frémont. The latter
candidate, however, withdrew from the field before the election.
In April, 1865, Mr. Garrison, with his English friend George
Thompson, was invited by the Government to be present as its guest
at the ceremony of raising the Stars and Stripes above the
surrendered Fort Sumter, and was received at Charleston with great
enthusiasm by the emancipated slaves. The news of President
Lincoln's assassination hastened the return of the party to the
North.
The practical extermination of the slave system by the adoption of
the 13th Amendment convinced Mr. Garrison that the purpose of the
Anti-Slavery Society and of _The Liberator_ had been accomplished.
He therefore withdrew from one and discontinued the other. After
thirty-five years of a stormy and precarious existence the last
number of _The Liberator_ was issued December 29, 1865. "Nothing
could have been more in keeping with the uniform wisdom of your
anti-slavery leadership than the time you chose for resigning it,"
wrote Lowell to Mr. Garrison a year later.
The recognition of the pioneer's unselfish service thereupon took
shape in a national testimonial reaching a sum exceeding thirty
thousand dollars, thenceforth lifting his life above the pecuniary
cares which had so long weighed upon it. A domestic grief in the
shape of a paralytic shock to his faithful wife occurred in
December, 1863, compelling a change of home from the city to an
attractive suburban house in Roxbury, known as Rockledge.
Although his great life-work was finished, Mr. Garrison abated no
activity in the various reforms in which he had enlisted. Both with
voice and pen he reached a wider and more attentive public, pleading
for justice to the freedman, for the legal emancipation of women,
the right of the Chinese to free immigration and Christian
treatment, freedom of trade (for he early eschewed his youthful
belief in the protective system), and for kindred causes.
Visiting England for the fourth time in 1867, a public breakfast was
given in Mr. Garrison's honor at St. James's Hall, June 29th. John
Bright presided, and among the addresses of welcome were those of
Earl Russell, the Duke of Argyll, John Stuart Mill, George Thompson,
and W. Vernon Harcourt. Later the freedom of the city of Edinburgh
was conferred upon the American abolitionist, and in August he
attended the International Anti-Slavery Conference at Paris,
representing the American Freedman's Union Commission, and meeting
Laboulaye, Cochin, and other eminent Frenchmen.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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