Page images
PDF
EPUB

And I therefore repeat the statement: The men who died for the Confederate cause, have not died in vain.

[merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]

Their heads may sodden in the sun; their limbs
Be strung to city gates and castle walls;

But still their spirits walk abroad. Though years
Elapse, and others share as dark a doom,

They but augment the deep and sweeping thoughts
Which overpower all others and conduct

The world at last to freedom."

HON. JAMES MERCER GARNETT.

AN ADDRESS BY PROFESSOR JAMES MERCER GARNETT,

On Presenting the Portrait of Hon. James M. Garnett in the Court-
Room at Tappahannock, Essex County, Va., Judge Thos.

R. B. Wright of the Circuit Court Presiding—
June 20, 1898.

[Judge Wright, who as worthily wears the ermine as he did honor to the cause, as. a Confederate soldier, has been indefatigable in his efforts to secure for the court-room at Tappahannock the portraits of distinguished and worthy men of the vicinage of his circuit. This comprehends a section which has been singularly productive of men whose lives have been excellent and who have signally aided in making the history of our State and country. The walls of his courtroom are now graced with a galaxy of the countenances of men of whose virtues and abilities any people.might justly be proud. Such an assembled view can but prove in the highest degree inspiriting and helpful in directing the character of youth. Judge Wright may look upon them with a pleasure peculiarly his own-as in his lifesprings he draws from more than one of them.

Nobility of character not only impels reverence, but it inspires the emulation of virtue-of greatness. To look upon the man, as his compeers saw him, aids potently in the mind the inspection of the record of his deeds.-ED.]

Your Honor, Ladies and Gentlemen:

I esteem it a great pleasure and privilege, sir, to present for preservation in this room, where justice is so worthily dispensed by your Honor, the portrait of my grandfather, who, in days long gone, sat in the old courthouse adjoining as a member of that magistrates' court, which reflected the hard common sense of the Virginia country farmer, and did equity between man and man with such sound judgment that it has been esteemed by those competent to judge the best system of county judiciary that the State ever possessed.

It is now more than half a century since he has lain in the grave, but there are some still living in this county, and perhaps within the sound of my voice, who may remember him—a tall, erect, dignified man-as he went in and out among you during the seventy-three years of his long life, for where he lived there he died and is buried, at Elmwood on the Rappahannock, never residing away from home except when he was serving the county or the State at Richmond or Washington.

Permit me then, sir, to read a brief sketch of the life of him whose portrait I entrust to your Honor's keeping.

The Hon. James Mercer Garnett, of Elmwood, Essex county, Va., was born June 8th, 1770, the second child and oldest son of ten children. His father, Muscoe Garnett, of Essex county, was the son of James Garnett and Elizabeth Muscoe, his second wife, the daughter of Captain Salvator Muscoe, and was the only child of that marriage. He was the grandson of John Garnett, of Gloucester county, supposed to be first of the family that came from England to this country, although this is not certain, as the family records do not trace his ancestry further back. Muscoe Garnett, as his father before him, was a large landed proprietor, and built Elmwood before the Revolutionary War. During that war he was a member of the Committee of Safety for Essex County, which regulated the military affairs of the county. He, his father, and his son were vestrymen of Vawter's church, built in 1731.

He married on July 19, 1767, Grace Fenton Mercer, daughter of John Mercer, of Marlborough, Stafford county, and his second wife Ann Roy. This John Mercer was born in Dublin, Ireland, in 1704, descended from an English family that had settled in Dublin, and was the first of that family who came to this country. His ancestry is traced back through his father, John Mercer, and mother, Grace Fenton and his grandfather, Robert Mercer, to his great-grandfather, Noel Mercer, of Chester, England. John Mercer, of Marlborough,

[ocr errors]

was an eminent lawyer and a very large landed proprietor, and was the author of "Mercer's Abridgment of the Laws of Virginia." A folio volume containing entries of all his landed property, its bounds and limits, when purchased and when sold, entered in his own neat, and regular hand, is still preserved.

James Mercer Garnett was educated at home, receiving the liberal private education customary in Virginia at that time. He married on September 21st, 1793, his first cousin, Mary Eleanor Dick Mercer, only daughter of Judge James Mercer, of Fredericksburg, and his wife, Eleanor Dick, daughter of Major Charles Dick, of Scottish parentage and of Revolutionary fame. James Mercer, after whom his nephew was named, was the fifth son and sixth child of the above mentioned John Mercer, of Marlborough, and his first wife, Catharine Mason, aunt of the distinguished statesman, George Mason, of Gunston Hall, Fairfax county, who wrote the Declaration of Rights and the first Constitution of Virginia, and is so well known in the early history of the State. James Mercer graduated at William and Mary College, was a member of the House of Burgesses of Virginia, of all the Virginia Conventions of the day, of the Virginia Committee of Safety that governed the State in 1775-76 until the inauguration of Patrick Henry as first Governor, July 1, 1776; he was also a member of the Continental Congress in 1779-80. He was appointed a judge of the General Court in 1780, and a judge of the Court of Appeals of five judges in 1789, in which year he was also appointed one of the revisors of the laws of Virginia. He was the father of General Charles Fenton Mercer, of Aldie, Loudoun county, who was a member of the Virginia Legislature, 1810-17, except while in military service during the war of 1812, of the United States Congress, 1817-39, of the Virginia Constitutional Convention of 1829-30 and was the first President of the Chesapeake & Ohio canal. The following is a brief record of the official life of James Mercer Garnett as far as it can be traced. I have been informed that he was a member of the Virginia Legislature of 1798-'99, and that he voted for the celebrated resolutions of that session denouncing the alien and sedition acts; but I think it is more probable that he was a member during the following session and voted for the adoption of Mr. Madison's report on those resolutions. Mr. Madison, the father of the resolutions, consulted often with Colonel John Taylor, of Caroline county, and Mr. Garnett, the intimate friend of Colonel Taylor, frequently participated in those consultations, which were often held in Mr. Garnett's room.

Mr. Garnett represented his district in the Congress of the United States for two terms, 1803-'09, when he addressed a letter to his constitutents declining a re-election. This letter was much praised by John Randolph, who tried hard to persuade him to offer for a re-election. The friendship between Mr. Garnett and Mr. Randolph lasted through life. In a speech in the United States Senate in 1828 Mr. Randolph refers to Mr. Garnett's services in Congress, and soon afterwards writes: "Our friendship commenced soon after he took his seat in Congress and has continued uninterrupted by a single moment of coolness or alienation during three and twenty years, and very trying times, political and otherwise. I take pride in naming this gentleman among my steady, uniform and unwavering friends. In Congress he never said an unwise thing, or gave a bad vote." (See Bouldin's "Reminiscences of John Randolph.” Appendix.)

An interesting correspondence between Mr. Randolph and Mr. Garnett of some 340 letters has been preserved, extending from 1806 to 1832, the year before Mr. Randolph's death. The originals of these letters are at Elmwood, and a copy is in my possession.

In August, 1807, Mr. Garnett served as a member of the grand jury that indicted Aaron Burr, of which jury Mr. Randolph was the foreman. Mr. William Wirt Henry, in his address before the Virginia State Bar Association, August 3, 1897, on "The Trial of Aaron Burr," calls this "the most distinguished grand jury that was ever impaneled.” (See Virginia Law Register, Vol. III, pages 477– 492.)

Mr. Garnett served again in the Virginia Legislature during the session of 1824-'25, and was a member of the Convention of 182930, called to amend the State Constitution. He opposed many of the changes in the Constitution made by that Convention, and was thus frequently found on the opposite side to his brother-in-law, Hon. Charles Fenton Mercer, who acted as chairman of the Committee on Resolutions, Mr. Madison, the appointed chairman, from his age and infirmities being unable to take a very active part in the work of the Convention. Mr. Garnett, a gentleman of "the old school," thought that greater weight should be given to land holders in the administration of government, and was opposed to the scheme adopted for the enlargement of the basis of suffrage. His membership of this Convention was his last service in any public capacity.

Permit me to to quote a few lines from Hugh Blair Grigsby's address on this Convention-the best account of it that we have-de

livered before the Virginia Historical Society, December 15, 1853, and contained in the Virginia Historical Reporter for 1854 (Vol. I., pp. 81-83), a very rare pamphlet.

Mr. Grigsby says: "Although as the contests of the Convention the lines of division were strictly drawn between the friends and opponents of the old constitution, now that those strifes are past, and most of the active spirits of those exciting times are no more, it may not be inappropriate to class two names together, which, though never on the same side of the perpetually recurring call of the roll, were bound by the cords of Christian affection and were united in the support of all the religious and humane schemes which honored the age in which they lived-James Mercer Garnett and William Harrison Fitzhugh. Garnett was by many years the elder of the two, and may be said to have closed his political life twenty years before the assembling of the Convention and before that of Fitzhugh had begun. He had been a member of the House of Delegates and was a member of the House of Representatives during the entire second term of Mr. Jefferson's administration; and though rarely engaged in prolonged debate, was an efficient coadjutor of the party at the head of which was Mr. Randolph, which opposed the policy of that statesman. Thenceforth he almost renounced public life, and devoted his time to agriculture, education, and religion, three great interests which then required all his fostering care. He was not far from sixty, but retained in his gait the elasticity and erectness of a young man. He did not make a formal speech during the session, but watched the progress of events with the strictest attention, and some one present may remember how distinctly his sonorous voice was heard above all others at the call of the ayes and nays, and was recognized at once. He was full of life and delighted in society, of which his polished manners, his humor deepening at times into a caustic wit, and his large historical recollections made him a brilliant ornament. If John Randolph excited the mirth of the Convention at the expense of Mr. Jefferson's 'mould-boards of the least possible resistance,' Garnett brought forth roars of laughter in private circles at Mr. Madison's scheme of hitching the bison to the plough. It was in the social gathering that the artillery of his political party was brought to bear with the most decided success; and many a young politician, who would have taken the alarm at an allusion to the embargo on the war, sunk under the raillery played against the philosopher and the farmer."

Mr. Garnett was a man of high education, as his writings show,

« PreviousContinue »