The Great North-Western Conspiracy in All Its Startling DetailsAyer, I. Winslow
History
The Great North-Western Conspiracy in All Its Startling Details
Ayer, I. Winslow
Knights of the Golden Circle; Northwestern Conspiracy, 1864
The palpable HYPOCRISY of rebel sympathizers, can now only excite
contempt. Who that read the evidence of Clement L. Vallandigham, before
the military commission in Cincinnati, gave him credit for sincerity
when he said substantially had he supposed there was a plot against the
Government, he would have been the first to oppose or expose it.
Have the people forgotten Mr. Vallandigham's record? Have his Dayton
neighbors forgotten his cry of "Ocoon," the cry of distress of the Order
to which he belonged, and which was to summon Sons of Liberty to
his rescue, when arrested by the Government? Have they forgotten
Vallandigham's visit to Fulton county, Illinois, during the autumn of
1864, and its consequences? This county was the stamping ground of the
leaders of the treasonable organization, which has been dissected, and
whose head and heart are now in a state of decomposition. In that county
Assistant Provost Marshal Phelps was shot, there too enrolling officer
Criss was shot; in that county is Lewiston, where resides S. Corning
Judd, Esq., the Grand Commander of the Sons of Liberty in the State of
Illinois. C.L. Vallandigham was the Supreme Commander of the Order
in the United States. This Order inaugurated the new warfare at the
instance of the Southern rebel leaders--inaugurated assassination. This
order began with Provost Marshals and enrolling officers, and ended--if
indeed the loyal people _will_ it to have ended--with the assassination
of the best, the wisest, the most deeply loved President since the
immortal Washington. It is the education of Copperhead prints, and
Copperhead secret societies that has fitted the instruments of death,
and our indulgence which has fostered them.
Vallandigham's party had been defeated, his greatness had departed, and
to wheel into line and "keep step to the music of the Union," was not
for him, and as Milton's creation once exclaimed, so might he have
uttered:
"And in my choice To reign is worth ambition, though in hell;
Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven.
But wherefore let me then our faithful friends,
The associates and co-partners of our loss,
Lie thus astonished on the oblivion pool,
And call them not to share with us their part
In this unhappy mansion; or once more
With rallied arms to try what may be yet
Regained in heaven, or what more lost in hell."
And so Clement L. Vallandigham became Supreme Commander of the Sons of
Liberty.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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