HALF A CENTURY. BY JANE GREY SWISSHELM. * * * * * "God so willed: Mankind is ignorant! a man am I: Call ignorance my sorrow, not my sin!" "O, still as ever friends are they Who, in the interest of outraged truth Deprecate such rough handling of a lie!" ROBERT BROWNING. 1880. PREFACE. It has been assumed, and is generally believed, that the Anti-slavery struggle, which, culminated in the Emancipation Proclamation of 1862, originated in Infidelity, and was a triumph of Skepticism over Christianity. In no way can this error be so well corrected as by the personal history of those who took part in that struggle; and as most of them have passed from earth without leaving any record of the education and motives which underlay their action, the duty they neglected becomes doubly incumbent on the few who remain. To supply one quota of the inside history of the great Abolition war, is the primary object of this work; but scarcely secondary to this object is that of recording incidents characteristic of the Peculiar Institution overthrown in that struggle. Another object, and one which struggles for precedence, is to give an inside history of the hospitals during the war of the Rebellion, that the American people may not forget the cost of that Government so often imperiled through their indifference. A third object, is to give an analysis of the ground which produced the Woman's Rights agitation, and the causes which limited its influence. A fourth is, to illustrate the force of education and the mutability of human character, by a personal narrative of one who, in 1836, would have broken an engagement rather than permit her name to appear in print, even in the announcement of marriage; and who, in 1850, had as much newspaper notoriety as any man of that time, and was singularly indifferent to the praise or blame of the Press;--of one who, in 1837, could not break the seal of silence set upon her lips by "Inspiration," even so far as to pray with a man dying of intemperance, and who yet, in 1862, addressed the Minnesota Senate in session, and as many others as could be packed in the hall, with no more embarrassment than though talking with a friend in a chimney corner. J.G.S. CONTENTS CHAPTER I. I FIND LIFE II. PROGRESS IN CALVINISM, HUNT GHOSTS, SEE LA FAYETTE III. FATHER'S DEATH IV. GO TO BOARDING SCHOOL V. LOSE MY BROTHER VI. JOIN CHURCH, AND MAKE NEW ENDEAVORS TO KEEP SABBATH VII. DELIVERER OF THE DARK NIGHT VIII. FITTING MYSELF INTO MY SPHERE IX. HABITATIONS OF HORRID CRUELTY X. KENTUCKY CONTEMPT FOR LABOR XI. REBELLION XII. THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH XIII. "LABOR--SERVICE OR ACT" XIV. SWISSVALE XV. WILLOWS BY THE WATER-COURSES XVI. THE WATERS GROW DEEP XVII. MY NAME APPEARS IN PRINT XVIII. MEXICAN WAR LETTERS