The Knickerbocker, Vol. 22, No. 1, July 1843Various
General
The Knickerbocker, Vol. 22, No. 1, July 1843
Various
Periodicals
When General Harrison came into power, multitudes of such fears
prevailed, and with fearful truth for their foundation. The good
old General himself had no wish to proscribe, but proscription was
the word with too many of his friends. I may mention a circumstance
which came under my own knowledge.
The head of a certain department, shortly before General Harrison's
death, turned out a clerk of his, who was accused of having busied
himself in politics--a poor man, who had a wife and six children.
She is a beautiful woman, but twenty-six years of age. Her agony
was such as to render her almost insane. The removal left her and
her children houseless and homeless, with the husband and father
in debt. Fiction has wrung many a heart to tears with a fancied
picture not to compare in sorrow to the truth of this. Shortly after
this removal, General Harrison died, and was laid in state in the
hall of the White House, whither flocked multitudes to gaze upon
his lifeless remains, and reflect upon the instability of earthly
power, and the vanity of all human greatness. I met the lady of the
removed official with, another lady, and but one escort, on their
way to look their first and last upon the departed President; and I
joined her. General Harrison I had known well, and I spoke of his
goodness of heart, and manliness of character, as we proceeded, with
an earnest truthfulness, which seemed to impress the wife of the
official, by whose side I walked.
'I blame ---- for my trouble,' she said, naming the head of the
department, half to herself; 'I believe the old General was
good-hearted.'
We entered the White House. In state, just before the entrance, lay
the General. His features were placid, and betrayed little or none
of the sufferings of the departed spirit. My companion gazed upon
him earnestly and long, and then said, with a hysteric start:
'I would to God it was ---- who was lying in that coffin! I'd give a
party to-night, poor as I am!'
One may well fancy how deep the agony of heart of a sensitive lady
must have been, to wring from her such an expression. In fancy,
she heard the voice of her children crying to her for bread; and
to her excited mind they appeared before her, dead as the departed
President, and of hunger; for so she said, in speaking of her
expression afterward.
It was a scene, in those days, to see the department 'let out,'
as the boys would say at school. The aspect of those clerks whose
political bias was known to be against the party in power, was
lugubrious enough. They did not look like gentlemen who, after their
official labors were over, were going to their dinners, but as if
they were wrapped in sorrow, and wending to a funeral.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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