I

XXIV.

CHAUNCEY M. DEPEW.

SAW Mr. Lincoln a number of times during the canvass for his second election. The characteristic which struck me most was his superabundance of common sense. His power of managing men, of deciding and avoiding difficult questions, surpassed that of any man I ever met. A keen insight of human nature had been cultivated by the trials and struggles of his early life. He knew the people and how to reach them better than any man of his time. I heard him tell a great many stories, many of which would not do exactly for the drawing-room; but for the person he wished to reach, and the object he desired to accomplish with the individual, the story did more than any argument could have done.

He said to me once, in reference to some sharp criticisms which had been made. upon his storytelling: "They say I tell a great many stories; I reckon I do, but I have found in the course of a long experience that common people"-and repeating it "common people, take them as they run,

are

more easily influenced and informed through the medium of a broad illustration than in any other way, and as to what the hypercritical few may think, I don't care."

He said: "I have originated but two stories in my life, but I tell tolerably well other people's stories." He said that," riding the circuit for many years and stopping at country taverns where were gathered the lawyers, jurymen, witnesses and clients, they would sit up all night narrating to each other their life adventures; and that the things which happened to an original people, in a new country, surrounded by novel conditions, and told with the descriptive power and exaggeration which characterized such men, supplied him with an exhaustless fund of anecdote which could be made applicable for enforcing or refuting an argument better than all the invented stories of the world."

Several times when I saw him, he seemed to be oppressed not only with the labors of the position, but especially with care and anxiety growing out of the intense responsibility which he felt for the issue of the conflict and the lives which were lost. He knew the whole situation better than any man in the administration, and virtually carried on in his own mind not only the civic side of the government, but all the campaigns. And I knew when he threw himself (as he did once when I was there) on a

lounge, and rattled off story after story, that it was his method of relief, without which he might have gone out of his mind, and certainly would not have been able to have accomplished anything like the amount of work which he did.

Governor Seymour was elected on the Democratic ticket in 1862 as Governor of the State of New York, and the following year I was elected at the head of the Republican ticket as Secretary of State. A law was passed by the Legislature, which was Republican, to take the soldiers' vote. Well, ordinarily this duty would have devolved upon the Governor. Because the Legislature in this instance imposed it upon me, I spent much time in Washington endeavoring to get the data to send out the necessary papers enabling the New York soldiers to vote. Under the Act each soldier was to make out his ballot, and it was to be certified by the commanding officer of his company or regiment, and then sent to some friend at his last voting place to be deposited on election day. It was therefore necessary for me to ascertain the location of every New York company and regiment. They were scattered all over the South, and in all the armies. Secretary Stanton refused to give me any information whatever, and, finally, with a great deal of temper, informed me one day that information of that character given to politicians would reach the newspapers, and through

them the enemy, and in that way the Confederates would know by the location of the New York troops precisely the condition and situation of every army corps, brigade, and battery. As I was leaving the War Department I met Mr. Washburne and the Marshal of the district coming in. Mr. Washburne said: "Depew, you seem to be in a state of considerable excitement." I told him of my interview with Mr. Stanton, and that I was going home to New York, and would publish in the morning papers a card that the soldiers' votes could not be taken, owing to the action of Secretary Stanton. And I added: "I can inform you that a failure to get them will lose Mr. Lincoln the electoral vote of New York." Mr. Washburne said: "You don't know Lincoln; he is as good a politician as he is a President, and if there was no other way to get those votes he would go round with a carpet-bag and collect them himself." He then asked me to wait until the President could be informed as to the facts. I stood in the corridor leading to Mr. Stanton's room, and in about fifteen minutes an orderly came out and said the Secretary wanted to see Mr. Depew. I went in, and Secretary Stanton met me with the most cordial politeness; inquired when I arrived in Washington, if I had any business with his department, and whether he could do anything for me. I restated to him what I had already stated at least

half a dozen times before. He sent me with an order so peremptory to the head of one of the bureaus, that I left Washington that night with a list and location of every organization of New York troops.

When I reached New York I summoned the officers of the express companies of that day to know if they could get the packages containing the blanks for the soldiers' votes to the various regiments and companies and batteries of New York troops, scattered as they were all over the South. Without consultation, they said it could not be done. I then sent for old Mr. Butterfield, the originator of the American Express Company, and stated the case to him. He said they were organized for such purposes, and if they could not accomplish them they had better disband. He then undertook to arrange through the various express companies, by his own direct superintendence, to secure the safe delivery in time to every company-and he succeeded.

This anecdote illustrates the difference between Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Stanton. Mr. Stanton, in his anxiety to protect the inviolability of the secrets of his department, was unable to see that if the administration of which he was a member was defeated in the election, the most disastrous result to the cause which he had at heart might follow, while Mr. Lincoln comprehended at once that the minor