CHAPTER XXXVIII

DEATH OF ARCHIBALD GERARD STUART AND
OF HIS MOTHER

IN MR. STUART'S retirement and old age, one object engaged his deepest interest,the education of his youngest child and only surviving son,-Archibald Gerard Stuart. When fifteen years of age, he was sent to Hampden-Sidney College, where he remained two sessions and made satisfactory progress in his studies. He was especially interested in the debating society and soon showed such talent that he was appointed debater at one of the college celebrations. He returned for the third session, and became a candidate for final orator, but contracted malaria and withdrew from college; and after recuperating a few weeks at home, he matriculated at the University of Virginia, of which his father was then the Rector. Though not eighteen years of age, he won the debater's medal in the Jefferson Literary Society during his first session. At the close of the session, owing to impaired health, he decided to read law in his father's office rather than to risk the close confinement of classrooms at the University. In less than a year, however, his health became so seriously impaired that he was advised to seek a change of climate in the West. At the age of twenty, he started to Colorado in search of health.

After five months, he returned home greatly improved and eager to take up his work. Two years later, in 1881, he was forced to return to the West, where he remained some months before returning home for the second time. For four years his life had been a succession of keen disappointments, and in the summer of 1883 he abandoned his profession and again sought to recuperate his health

in the West. He had no definite plans for the future, but was induced by a friend to visit St. Paul, Minnesota. There his health began to improve, and he sought employment. He made friends easily, and soon he and his friend became partners in an established real estate business. Active employment, coupled with the invigorating climate, produced marked improvement in his strength and spirits, and for a time it seemed that his health was being rapidly restored. In the summer of 1884, however, he was again forced to return home. Weeks and months passed without improvement, and on February 13th, 1885, he quietly passed away in his father's home.

Mr. Stuart had kept a diary all his life, embracing many personal and family matters. It was continued regularly up to February 5th, 1891, eight days before his death, and scarcely a day passed without some entry. After his son died, Mr. Stuart made only one entry in his diary for ten days. That entry was as follows:

"About 20 minutes after 6 o'clock A. M. of this, the 13th day of February, 1885, my last surviving son, Archibald Gerard Stuart, died * * **. With him have perished my fondest hopes and most cherished aspirations."

Mrs. Stuart repeatedly expressed the wish to have some memorial of her youngest son prepared and printed for distribution among his friends, as well as her own. So persistent was this desire on her part that finally her daughter, Mrs. Margaret Briscoe Stuart Robertson, who was only three years older than her brother, prepared the following sketch:

"Archibald Gerard Stuart was the youngest son and child of Alex. H. H. Stuart and Frances C. Baldwin, daughter of the late Judge Briscoe G. Baldwin, of the Supreme Court of Appeals of Virginia. Descended on the maternal side from such men as Chancellor Brown and Judge Baldwin; called for his grandfather, Judge Archibald Stuart, and his only surviving uncle, Gerard B. Stuart; bearing a name

which, for one hundred and fifty years, had been in the county a synonym for intellect and honor, he was born to a rich inheritance of talents, fame, and favor.

"Two gifted brothers, aged twenty-three and twentyone years, God had taken, just as they were entering manhood; and now, after an interval of twenty years, buried hopes revived in the hearts of the parents, and in the son of their old age the father saw a staff for his declining years-Joseph was not, and Simeon was not, but in the little Benjamin of his race his joy should be full. Born of a gray-haired mother, over whom storms of sorrow had swept, he was emphatically a mother-boy, for years the baby plaything of a family of grown children.

"At an early age he seemed conscious of the great hopes centered in him, as the last of a line of great and useful men, and the last of the good old name.

"As a child, he was remarkable for the beauty of his countenance, gentleness, and shyness of disposition, and an absorbing devotion to his mother. From his earliest youth he was quiet in his habits, and though not a scholar, in the truest sense of the word, he was an insatiate reader on all subjects, preferring books and the society of his mother to most out-of-door amusements. Many will remember the childish cry that went up at the death of his grown brother: 'You have got me, Mother, You have got me left!' And later on, in other times of affliction, how the boy, with clasping arms, sought to support and comfort her.

"At the age of fifteen he was sent to Hampden-Sidney College, then under the direction of his brother-in-law, Reverend J. M. P. Atkinson. There he remained for two sessions, and made good progress in all his studies. It was there that he threw off his great natural timidity, making the determination, at all costs, to become a speaker; and such was his progress and improvement that he was almost immediately appointed debater at one of the college celebrations, and soon showed unusual talent in declamation and in the delivery of his speeches.

"He was entered for a third session at Hampden-Sidney,

and became a prominent candidate for final orator and the debater's medal, but having contracted chills he was withdrawn, and a few weeks later entered as a student at the University of Virginia, of which his father was then Rector. There all the pride and ambition of his nature was called out by intercourse and competition with clever men, mostly his seniors and with a far larger knowledge of the world. Though not yet eighteen, he determined not to be lost in the crowd, nor to be unworthy of his father's name and his kinship with John B. Baldwin and John W. Daniel, whom the old University still cherished as her children.

"Rather grave by nature, he was intimate with few, familiar with none. He was of tall statue, with remarkably handsome and clear-cut features, and always courteous in manner, fluent and easy in conversation, he was popular with all. Though free in proclaiming his opinions, he was ever reticent in the expression of his feelings and inner experience; he had a dry sense of humor, and at times a keenness of sarcasm, which left some under the false impression that he had a proud, cold nature.

"Those who loved him best also best knew the beauties and foibles of his nature; and that he was a person of prejudice and of strong feeling for an adversary as well as for a friend, none will deny.

"At the University success again rewarded his efforts, and at the age of eighteen, and during his first session there he was carried on the shoulders of his fellow-students around the Lawn and proclaimed successful competitor for their highest honor,-the debater's medal which had been awarded by the Faculty.

Richmond Dispatch, June 27, 1877.

"Mr. Southall, the President of the Society, then made the presentation speech of the society medal to the best debater of this session. His remarks were short and to the point, and in presenting the medal to Mr. Stuart, he felt

satisfied that the Jefferson Society would never regret the selection of medalist that session.

"'Mr. A. G. Stuart of Staunton, Va., is the son of Hon. Alex. H. H. Stuart. He is a mere youth in appearance, easy, graceful, and has a fine, rich voice, which will yet be heard beyond the walls of the public hall of the University. Mr. Stuart returned thanks for the medal and reminded the Society of some of its members who were great-in literature, Moseley and Poe; in politics, Bailey and Toombs; in religion, Broaddus and Dudley. He then referred to the way in which the people of the South are living on the reputation of the dead, while the people of the North are advancing. He appealed to his fellow-students to make names for themselves and closed his little speech by saying: 'And now surrounded by philosophers and scholars, by statesmen and orators, by the beauty and chivalry of the South, I must not detain you longer; for inexperience should not advise experience, nor should youth speak where wisdom holds her peace.

"Sitting near where stood the youthful orator was his venerable father, Hon. A. H. H. Stuart. Though bowed with age and toil, I thought I could see his eye glisten with the fire of youth as he listened to his boy, who will possibly take the place of his father in the love and affection of the people of Virginia.'

"With such a beginning, is it any wonder that hopes should have run high, and the eyes of many been turned upon him in bright expectancy for the future?

"Born, raised and educated among lawyers, with a fine library and a large patronage awaiting him, his mind turned naturally to the profession of the law, and he began the study of it in his father's office. Before the year was out, while the fast-coming evening of life promised fair to the aged parents, and his bright morning had but just begun, disease laid sudden hold upon him and for a time his life was in jeopardy. Regaining his strength somewhat, after trying for some months the effects of medicine, change of scene and short trips, it was at last decided he must seek