Bio of Ezra Marsh Boring

Contributed by Sharon Cook "Briggs" MacInnes Reminiscences Ezra Marsh Boring - Written in 1891 Numbers contained within Brackets in the text indicates a page number My full name is Ezra M. Boring; I am a regular D.D. I will speak first of my ancestry. My grandfather’s name was Thomas Boring. He was born in Baltimore County, Maryland. There was a large family of that name in region of Baltimore which had spread out through the south, and nearly all of that name in the south and southwest are in some way connected. There is a Dr. Jesse Boring in the south who has figured conspicuously in the southern Methodist Episcopal church; and there is John Boring, M.D. of Nashville, Tennessee, and brother of the Rev. Peter R. Borin (his father spelled his name “Boring.”) This Peter R. Boring was the great revivalist of Chicago, and it was through his influence Mrs. Garret was converted and brought to Christ, and the result of it was the Garrett Biblical Institute. He died at a comparatively young age in the city of Chicago, universally lamented, greatly beloved. They are all of the same family, related in some way as those who have examined the genealogy affirm. Dr. Ammon Boring, a D.D., is of the same family. I do not know the name of my grandmother Boring before she was married. My grand-parents were married in Kentucky; they having moved from Maryland to Kentucky and settled in Bracken Co., Ky. They subsequently moved in Clermont County, Ohio. He had several sons and daughters; I don’t [2] remember the names of them all; but my father’s name was Reuben, and his brothers were Isaac, Ephraim, and Thomas. My uncle, Ephraim Boring, was with Gen. William Henry Harrison in the Battle of Tippecanoe and served under him in the Indian warfare. Isaac, Ephraim and Thomas, moved to Indiana. There are a great many of that name in Indiana. My grandfather Boring had several daughters. There were Ann, Rebecca, and Jane. I don’t remember any others. That much for my grandfather’s family on my father’s side. My mother’s maiden name was Marsh. She was born in Baltimore Co., Maryland. My grandfather Marsh married for his wife a woman by the name of Leavens. Her name was Patience. She was a remarkable woman, frail in health all her life long; was a woman of great decision of character and purity of life and was well named Patience. My grandfather Marsh had charge of, I don’t know what they call it, under the colonial form of government, but it was a large estate owned in England, consisting of a plantation and a large stock of about three hundred slaves. He had leizure on his hands and in early life was given to what is known in the south as occasional sprees,--drunkenness, and would fight anybody according to the southern style. He had several children born to him in that period, I don’t remember the order. He had a son William who became a Methodist preacher after they settled in the west. There [3] was Richard and a John [the names Thomas and Joseph are written above this line, presumably in Ezra Marsh Boring’s handwriting]; I don’t remember any others of the Marsh family. He had several daughters; one was called Rebecca, another Anna, and my mother Temperance [the names Nancy and Patience are written above this line], who was older than some of the others, I don’t remember the order. These were all born in Maryland. My grandfather Marsh spent a good deal of his leisure time in Baltimore with “hale fellows well met.” One time he left his wife and children with about three hundred slaves several weeks. He was drunk most of the time—a regular spree. When he woke up out of his spree he thought; “Well, I have abused my wife now. I have left her there with her small children, servants and slaves; it was a mean thing to do. I will carry her home a present.” He looked around and bought a large family bible and brought it home. My grandmother met him without chiding him; without saying a word. He said to her, “Well, Patience, I have brought you home a present; here is a bible.” She thanked him. My grandfather was fond of reading; that was a new book and he commenced reading in the bible. In the course of his reading he came to the narrative of Jonadab, son of the Rechabite, and he read about his temperance principles,- that they would not drink any liquors of any kind, and how God honored him and his family because of his temperance habits. He looked the narrative all over and said; “Well, that is not my course.” As he sat reading one day—it was in the morning—he said to grandmother, “Where are the children?” “They [two words indistinct].” [4] “Call them in,” he said. She obeyed him the same as the least slave on the farm did. They were called in; they were all seated. He took that Bible between his two hands and said, “I solemnly swear on this Holy book that I will never touch another drop of liquor, except it be at the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.” When he made up his mind he made it up. It was of a positive character, very firm and very decided. The family moved sometime in 1790 west. They came down the Ohio river on a raft-boat and landed at what they called at that time, Limestone, now Maysville, Kentucky, and settled in Braken [sic] county. To show how my grandfather maintained his integrity when he got to be an old man; he was sick for the first time in his life and the family physician was called. When he came, he said to my grandmother, “Give him a brandy toddy,” which was according to the practice in those days; “it will prepare him for the medicine.” That was a notion of practitioners in those days. My grandmother said, “He will not take it.” But the doctor said, “He doesn’t know anything. Let me have it.” So he poured out some brandy, sugar and water and said, “Here, Mr. Marsh, take this.” He took it into his mouth and tasted what it was and spurted it out on the floor, then looked up and said to the doctor, “You scoundrel, will you make me break my oath; if I was up I would cane you out of my house. My grandmother and grandfather lived to be very old. [5] My grandfather was fond of riding on horseback; always did everything on horseback, and after he was ninety years of age he could mount his horse from the ground without any assistance. His horse finally moved a step from him and he fell and broke his leg, which resulted in his death. That much about my forefathers. He (Mr. Marsh) had sons and daughters. My father was married to my mother in Braken county, Kentucky, November 26th, 1801. I am speaking now of my father’s and mother’s family. As I have said before, my mother’s name was Temperance Marsh. Shortly after the marriage they moved into Claremone [sic] county, Ohio, and settled near the village of Felicity. Of their children, the first born was named Nancy, and my brother Nicholas Leavens, was the only brother I had. Then there followed after that Patience, Rebecca, Asseneth, Elizabeth, and myself. I was the youngest of the family of seven. I was born June 12th, 1813 near Felicity, O., in Claremont county. At the time of my birth my father was greatly afflicted with what they called consumption, but from the best account I have it was nothing but Bright’s disease of the kidneys. He suffered with it for some time and finally died March 28th, 1814, while I was still an infant. My father’s illness was of long continuance. He had settled on a new place, woodland, which he was clearing up, and out of which he got a living for himself and family. At his death it became necessary for the support of the [6] family that we should be divided and my sister Patience went to live with my grandmother Marsh. She was named after my grandmother Marsh and she was brought up in Braken county, Kentucky. My sister Asseneth was taken by my mother’s brother, Richard Marsh and was brought up by him near Batavia, Ohio, in Claremont county. My sister Nancy, the eldest of the family was married to a man by the name of Jacob Chapman. Chapman’s father was a distiller; nobody thought anything of it and there was no objection that I ever heard of on the part of my mother of the marriage of my sister to this man Chapman. He drank everyday I suppose; most everybody else did this. In his way for many years he was a prosperous man, made his money by conveying his stuff to market in Cincinnati; which was about 32 miles east of Cincinnati. He became the father of a pretty large family. It is not necessary to give the names of these children; he lived to be eighty years of age. At the latter part of his life he was dissipated,--the only one of my family on either side except my grandfather before he made the firm resolve that he would not drink any more, was dissipated. My brother, Nicholas, a small boy of fourteen, took charge of the farm and with my mother’s assistance supported the family that was left in a small way. My mother re-married in 1820, it was on October [this is crossed out and “Dec” is written above it] 20th, a man named Andrew Nevin. He lived near the village of what is now called Sardinia, Brown county, O. [7] He was a man of no great intelligence and was a good man and Christian man. My mother took with her only three of her children: Rebecca, Elizabeth and myself. My brother set out for himself—to take care of himself. It was a very obscure neighborhood and a great many poor people, and they were all about alike. They settled on a tax title and cleared up quite a little farm. He had sons and daughters. It is needless to mention them. My brother Nicholas L. was very fond of reading, fond of education; he was remarkable good to his mother. There was never a better son to a mother than my brother to my mother. I was the youngest member of the house. The religious life of the family. I do not know that my grandfather Boring ever became in the true sense of the word a Christian man. My grandfather Boring was distinguished for being the source of amusement to the neighborhood, and was not a Christian man as I understood it. My grandfather Marsh at a very early period was a member of the English church. During all his life, even when he was a dissipated man, he received the sacrament in that church. After his temperance resolves an itinerant Methodist preacher found him, and Bishop Asbury visited his home, and he became a member of the M. E. church, at the time when it was not organized as a church in 1784. My father became a member of the M. E. church, and thus the choice of grandfather Marsh determined the religious [8] character of the whole family, and no one, so far as I know—that is, the Marsh family—were ever members of any other branch of the Christian church, but the church of his choice,--the Methodist Episcopal church. He chose himself and chose for his generation the church of which he became a member and in which he died. My mother kept up regular home family worship, and read every day from the blessed Book. I remember her reading, though I could not have been more than three or four years old,--and her prayer every day in our home. It was in the morning she took time for worship. My brothers and two sisters were converted to Christ at what is known as Gregg’s camp-ground, where subsequently Bishop Randolph S. Foster was converted with thousands of others. I can remember when quite a child,--four or five years of age,--of standing out of the door of my mother’s cabin—a very small cabin—and hearing the people sing in the revival which followed the camp-meeting in Felicity, Ohio. That marvelous man of God, John Strange, well-known in Methodism and especially in Indiana, was the instrument of carrying forward that revival. I can remember at that early day that he visited my mother’s home in her cabin. He came along toward night, and in the early dawn played with the children out of doors, pursuing fire-bugs, which was great amusement to me, and I was very much interested in him. I can remember how he looked. He was a tall, comparatively thin, spare man, with [9] a black head of hair, dark eyes, and wore a straight-breasted coat. I have his picture in my mind now. I remember of his reading the scriptures in the morning family worship, and I can remember that he read about Martha and Mary and Lazarus; I can remember is prayer; how he prayed for the widow and her children and did not forget the baby boy that knelt on the stool beside my mother. That much for the religious life of the household. My mother for many years thought my brother would become a preacher, but he never did. He married and had three children. One he called Temperance after his mother—my mother, another John, and his youngest son and his youngest son he called Nicholas Ezra for himself and for me. These children with their mother moved into Indiana, and the Rev. Nicholas Ezra Boring of the Indiana Conference of the M. E. church is his youngest son. My sisters married and settled; Patience married a man by the name of Meford in Kentucky, where she lived nearly all of her life. My next sister Rebecca married a man by the name of Hugh Nevin, who was her step-brother; they had two children. The son is now living. He called him Andrew after his father. He is living in Topeka, Kansas. His daughter Nancy married a man by the name of Hetherington, and finally settled in Bloomington, Illinois, where he recently died. They have two daughters. That much about my family. I know personally but little of my family as we removed from they [sic] at a very early [10] period, and they were scattered in various directions over the country. That much for my ancestry. The education of the family. My own education. My early opportunities, during my childhood and boyhood, were extremely limited. I was not remarkably fond of books and newspapers, were scarce things in my early home. I was a lad when the first newspapers ever came into that home. I went to school three months in the winter and worked on the farm the other nine months. Of course I had forgotten a great deal that I had learned from one term of school to another, with the poorest class of teachers and the most limited opportunities. When I was sixteen years of age I went with my step-father in a market wagon to Cincinnati, Ohio. We lived about 45 miles east of Cincinnati, and it was our market town. We carried our chickens and butter and eggs, and bought those of our neighbors; and most of the money we saw, as a rule, came from what we sold as produce in the Cincinnati market. We went in a covered wagon and slept in the wagon. We were usually gone three nights and two days to go to Cincinnati and back. When I was sixteen years old I remained in Cincinnati and hired out to drive a cart, for which I received fifty cents a day. How long I remained there I do not remember, but that was the first money that I ever owned, except what my grandfather Marsh would give me when he visited my mother. I never had any money given to me [“that I remember” is written above the line] [11] because my people had none, not even to buy gingerbread at general training days. Other boys had, and I thought it was marvelously strange that the other boys of the neighborhood should have some, and I not have any. Such were my surroundings. When I was seventeen years old I was apprenticed to a saddler and harness-maker. The man to whom I was apprenticed was named Matthew Day. He lived in the neighborhood, but subsequently moved to Georgetown, Brown Co., Ohio. Here I learned the trade, remaining there some three years. There lived in Georgetown at that time the Hon. Thomas L. Hamer, who became a member of Congress and who figured conspicuously in the Mexican war. He died at Montero, Mexico. There also lived there at that time Jesse R. Grant, the father of the far famed Ulysses R. Grant. Jesse R. Grant had a little tannery that he worked mostly himself, and I being apprenticed in the shop, had the errands to do, and I was frequently at the tannery of Jesse R. Grant. He was then Jesse R. Grant; was in politics a whig. Thomas L. Hamer was a democrat, and would have been a candidate for the presidency if he had lived instead of Pierce, who was nominated and elected. Thomas L. Hamer had a wonderful influence over me as he frequently visited the shop; it was a sort of club-room of politicians; my employer was quite a politician and loved to have people come in and talk on the politics of the day. I can remember them distinctly. [12] Jesse R. Grant’s family. He had married a woman by the name of Hannah Simpson, of Scotch origin. I remember her very distinctly,--a plain woman, very unassuming and modest. She was a Christian woman. U.S. Grant was a small boy when I was quite an old lad. He was brought up very tenderly by his parents and never was remarkable in his boyhood for anything that I knew of only that he excelled in arithmetic, horsemanship and in perseverance. Well, I met in that same shop a man by the name of Farrier, a man of considerable reading for those days. I, at an early period had attached myself to the church as a seeker of religion without being converted. After I removed to Georgetown I conveyed my membership there along with the family with whom I lived. This man Farrier, as I have said, frequently came into the shop, and talked of his principles, purposed to be skeptical on the subject of religion, and he talked to me of doctrines that I never had heard of. He took me to his home and showed me his library. I remember that he had among his books Tom Paine’s “Age of Reason”, book of Ethan Allen, and he had the far famed arguments of Hume upon the subject of the resurrection of Christ. I never had heard of these books. I never had read of the theories they advanced. He gave them to me to read and I read them, and I often assumed with the boys in the shop and out of it the arguments of Hume upon the subject of the resurrection of Christ. I debated with them and [13] was often lead to think that I triumphed over them. I was then nominally a member of the church. I was moral, used no bad words, or drank any liquor. I sometimes smoked, not often. I remember at a camp-meeting held not very far from Georgetown, where the far famed Henry B. Bascom, later in life Bishop Bascom of the M. E. church in the south, preached. He was a remarkable preacher, and wonderful man, and he preached at that camp-meeting on the resurrection of Christ in which he met the argument of Hume. The result of that sermon was a deep conviction that I was in error in assuming the ground that Hume did on the resurrection of Christ; and subsequently in December of that year, 1832, there was a quarterly meeting held ion Georgetown. The Rev. James B. Finley was the Presiding elder, and George W. Malley and Henry E. Pilcher were the preachers. The result of that meeting was a great revival of religion. They had what they called the “mourner’s bench” and invited seekers of religion to it. As I recollect it, I was the first one to kneel at that mourner’s bench; I was there night after night as a seeker after religion for many nights. I remember one night that Jesse R. Grant came kneeling at my left,--the father of U. S. Grant. Mrs. Grant was a member of the church and a very good woman. Jesse R. Grant’s house was very near the little church. It was out of the village a piece on a little rise of ground just above Jesse R. Grant’s house, yet it contained the preachers; it [14] was given to entertaining preachers during the quarterly meetings. During that meeting a great many were converted; among them Jesse R. Grant and Thomas L. Hamer made a profession of religion. That was in December, 1832. From that date to this I have been a member of the church. The Lord has wonderfully kept and preserved me. Of my boyhood between the ages of six and seventeen I have spoken somewhat. I want to speak more of my home after my mother re-married. I have mentioned that, I think. I have said our folks were poor; so they were, but they built the first brick-house in the neighborhood; it was a great curiosity. We had the first old fashioned pendulum clock that I ever saw in the neighborhood. I would give fifty dollars for it now if I could buy it. My mother was a woman of great strength of mind, was a great reader, had a great memory, retained everything that she read and everything that she heard, and was remarkable for what I am not remarkable,--the recollection of names and dates. When she said a thing occurred at a certain date, her memory was nearly infallible. She retained her memory to the last in her declining years. Her daughter, Rebecca Nevin, inherited the same quality of mind. My sister died in Bloomington, Illinois, at the home of her daughter, Mrs. Heatherington, whom I have named. She was nearly blind, but she kept up her memory of names and dates and persons and places in a remarkable degree in last years. [15] My mother was a very decided woman, decided in her government, mild but firm. She expected obedience from her children, which was had without any great trouble. She was a woman of decided Christian character, and is well described in the thirty-first chapter of the Book of Proverbs, which is really her biography. I never said an unkind word to my mother, and her influence over me was unbounded and is still; it was with me when away from home and tempted to do wrong, and I carry that influence to the present day. She molded and fashioned my young life. I am indebted to her for my well-being. Her daughters and sons inherit the qualities of character largely that she had had. It came down from grandfather Marsh, whom I have named. Now, a little more about my home. Our house was the largest hall in the neighborhood, and we had preaching every other Wednesday by the circuit riders that used to come and preach in the house; it was a church and house in one. We entertained the preachers, and I was the stable-boy and took care of the horses. I have groomed many a horse of many an old itinerant preacher. I groomed some better than others because I liked the preachers better. There were preachers who had a great influence over me in forming my character. One was the Rev. Arza Brown. He was the father of Mrs. Isaac R. Hitt, president now of the Western Branch of the Womans’ Foreign Missionary Society. She lives in the village of [16] Evanston. I knew her when she was a child, more than half a century ago. Now I come down again to the time of my conversion in 1832. I have said that I was not very fond of books and learning in my boyhood, and I was converted all through and through. There came with that conversion an ardent thirst of information and knowledge, and my conversion awakened me all over, morally and intellectually. It was a thorough radical change. In 1833 I completed my apprenticeship to the saddler’s trade and went out to do for myself. I worked as a journeyman at the business in various places, different towns. I never sought business but once in my life, then I did not get it. The business sought me, and people who had work to do wanted me. I had a little money that I received from my folks and which I invested in goods of that sort, and with a man by the name of Copeland started a saddler’s shop in Williamsburg, Ohio, which was a small town and rather worn out. Williamsburg, Ohio was the home of Professor Swing’s mother. She was a widow. I do not remember him, but he was born in that town and brought up there. The business was not enough to support two and I bought my partner out. During the time I lived there I was under Rev. Isaac Hunter of the Ohio Conference, he appointed me a class leader and I held a class, the first official position I held in the church. I said I bought my partner out; but he had a girl [17] that he loved and he came back and worked for me and courted the girl and married her and bought me out, and so I returned to Georgetown, Ohio. Here I conducted a shop for a man by the name of John Walker for a while, acting as foreman. During the time I was there I spent my leisure hours in study. Speaking of the men that influenced me, there was a Methodist preacher by the name of Levi P. Miller, an unmarried man, and he made his home with Mrs. Jesse R. Grant. I used to visit him frequently. He had a systematic mind and shaped my studies for me, told me what to read and what to study. I took a course of private instruction under a lawyer and local preacher by the name of Thomas H. Lynch, now Dr. Thomas H. Lynch of the Southeastern Indiana Conference and living in Indianapolis. With him I studied grammar, history, Hedges’ Logic, and rhetoric. In 1838, I was licensed as a local preacher and recommended to the Ohio Conference, but was not received. I formed the acquaintance of a Miss Rebecca Barns, who became subsequently my wife. During the time that my recommendation was being acted upon, I went to Dover, Kentucky and worked for a Mr. Keith at my trade. While I was there I received a letter informing me that my application had not been presented to the conference, and hence I had no appointment. I worked at my trade with Mr. Keith in Dover. The Rev. H. H. Cavanaugh, later Bishop Kavanaugh of the M. E. church south, came to that town and preached. [18] He was acting as agent for the Augusta College, one of the first colleges of the Methodist Episcopal church. Some one told him of me, and he said he wanted a preacher for a circuit where his family lived, and asked me to meet him at a certain quarterly meeting which he was going to attend back of Augusta, [Kentucky], located on the Ohio river. I went there and he proposed to take me to his home, give me a home with his family, access to his library, and what help he could give me. He preached at the quarterly meeting and I was there; but a friend of mine from Felicity, Ohio, by the name of William I. Flee met me and said—before Cavanaugh saw me—that a man by the name of Simmons wanted to see me—Brother Simmons, he called him—and took me up and introduced me to him. Bro. Simmons told me that he had located as a preacher, had taken his family to Augusta to educate his children. He had some money and he thought it would be a good thing to start a saddler’s shop and take some man who wanted to go to school as a superintendent of the saddler shop,--general manager we call it now. Well, I was glad to hear that. “What is your proposition,” I said. “I will tell you what I will do. I will board you, give you a room, lights and fuel, and will give you eight dollars a month, and you are to work five hours every day, five days in the week and all day Saturday and all vacations.” I said, “Agreed. I will go.” Just then all the people had gone out of doors, according to the [19] Kentucky style. The Rev. Kavanaugh came into the church door and called my name. I answered. He said he wanted to see me and told me what for. He wanted me to be the junior preacher of the circuit where his family lived. I told him I had just arranged to go to college. He said that was right. I had a quasi-engagement with Miss Barns, and I wrote to her, stating what I had done, and said, “Now it will be a long time to wait for me to go to college. I am going to school; you may consider yourself released or release me.” I went to see her after I had written to her, and she said that she was glad I had a chance to go to school, and that she would wait; which she did for four years, then I married her. She died two years ago last July in this house [“1887” is written above the line, but it should be 1889], the mother of my children. The fourth day of last October would have been the forty-ninth anniversary of our marriage if she had been living. Well, I took the regular course. It was a very small college with a very limited curriculum of study. It had in it the Rev. Joseph S. Tomlinson as president. Well he was a find scholar and a remarkably fine preacher. The boys used to call him the “Addison” of the Methodist church. He had a great deal of influence over me. And we had the famous Henry B. Bascom of world-wide reputation as an orator. Very few men had such a reputation as an orator as he had. He was the professor of belles-lettres and history; and then we had for the Greek and Latin professorship a man by the name of [20] McCowan; and the Rev. Joseph M. Trible was professor of mathematics. He was a member of the Ohio Conference. He was the son of an ex-governor of Ohio. I cannot delineate his character; he recently died at Columbus, Ohio. He was a far famed pulpit orator, and exerted a wide influence over me, and all connected with him. I remained in that school until I graduated in 1842 as a Bachelor of Arts. I became principal of what was called Franklin Seminary in Washington County, Kentucky in the neighborhood of what was known as the Worthington neighborhood. It was a small school with a big name, but they paid a fine salary. My salary was about nine hundred dollars a year at that time. During the time I was there I was married to Miss Rebecca Barnes in Cincinnati, Ohio, by the Rev. A. W. Sehon, D. D., the far famed pulpit orator, who subsequently joined the M. E. church south. I remained in that school one year after my marriage. I resigned the situation and joined the Ohio Annual Conference in 1843, and was stationed at Gallipolis, Ohio. Gallipolis was a French town, settled by descendants of French people, located on the Ohio river. On Christmas Day, 1843, my daughter Laura Jane was born. It was a great event. My church was an old church innocent of paint and located a little out of the village, but I had the village largely under my control. There was an old Presbyterian minister there, and he had a church down [21] town in the place, and he and I were the only preachers in the place, but the people came to me. My ministry was well received. The French who are not given to attending church much but when one of them dies, then they must have a funeral, however bad he might have been in life, and they usually called on me. I have attended four funerals in one day in that town. I had a remarkable experience there. A man died of drunkenness—delirium tremens—and they came to me to have the funeral in my church. I told them yes. There were a great many hard characters in the town,--saloon-keepers and hard drinkers. I remember we wondered that they asked me to preach the funeral, and I thought “what shall I preach?” “I will take this: “He being dead, yet speaking” That was said of Abel in Hebrews. Well, that was my text. My introduction to the sermon was; This man did not die a natural death, he was killed; (There were a lot of saloon-keepers before me) And some of you have killed him, and you are killing other people. The sermon was of that character all the way through. They only came to hear me on funeral occasions, and that was my chance to free my mind on the temperance question. When I came home, Mrs. Boring said to me: “Mr. Boring, what have you done! Why, they will mob you; I am afraid to stay here; I never heard such a talk. What do you mean?” I said that was my only chance, so I freed my mind on that subject. Well, they did not mob me. The next day one of the number met me [22] and gave me a twenty dollar gold piece for attending that funeral; and I took it home and gave it to my wife, saying: Here is the mob you spoke about. This is what they gave me. I had another remarkable experience in my pastorate in that town. I had as a member of the church a man recently converted—a merchant in the village. That merchant was not thought to be a genuine Christian by the world. He became one of my stewards and president of the board of stewards, and paid one third of my salary, which was one hundred dollars for myself, one hundred for my wife, sixteen for my baby, and a hundred for my table and the parsonage. He paid one third of that. I preached a sermon the commencement of my second year there, on what constitutes a Christian, in which I told what a man might be and do for the sake of worldly prosperity without being a Christian. The next morning,--Monday morning—he came to see me and said he wanted to see me in my study alone. I was glad to see him. Then, when he got me alone he told me I had insulted him. I told him I didn’t know when or where I had insulted him. My sermon the day before was personal, he said. I asked him in what points. He named those points. “Well,” said I, “Brother Fisher, when I prepared that sermon and when I preached it I never thought it applicable to you or anybody else.” He said no man had a right to occupy the pulpit in such a way that the people say that he refers to such a man. [23] The people said I refered to him. “Well,” said I, “Brother Fisher, I cannot be responsible for the speech of the people. They are very generous in giving away the gospel—anything which did not fit they gave it to themselves.” I said that I preached for the purpose of producing conviction. If the gospel hits a man I think the best thing he can do is to make the best out of it and mind his ways. Of course he was angry. That was Monday. We had our official meeting Monday night; it was the first official meeting of the conference year when my salary was to be settled. Mr. Fisher told the other members of the board of stewards that he could not attend that meeting and that he should not support me that year. They came together and talked matters over. The question of salary came up, and they said they thought they ought to give as much as before, but they did not see how they were going to pay it. Then they asked what was the matter with Bro. Fisher. I told them; then they told me that he had paid one-third of my salary the year before. I said to them: I did not become a preacher for the sake of making money. I left a place where I was getting three times as much as I had here, and if that is the point on which we stick, I will give you here and now a receipt for all that Bro. Fisher paid last year to be applied on my salary this year. Well, they fixed the salary as it was the year before. The men of the town heard of it; and wicked French infidels said to me: [24] You go on preaching the truth; we do not go to hear you much because we can’t stand it. You fire at us every time we go there, but you will never lack a warm meal while you stay in this place. You showed Old Fisher his picture, and he don’t like it.” I was never better supported than I was in that town. I have since received a salary of three thousand dollars, but I never left a pastorate [“at the end of the term” is written above the line] with as much money and clothes as I did from my salary of three hundred [“sixteen” is written above the line] dollars in that town. I married everybody, preached everybody’s funeral, and for marrying I received from two or three couple one day thirty or forty dollars so that that supplemented my salary, and with the presents we received I was abundantly and amply supported. The Lord blessed my ministry, many souls were converted and added to the church. An incident about the birth of my daughter. She was born Christmas day. My wife had made up a great many clothes for the incoming baby; she had them washed and hung out in the yard over night. The next morning after the baby was born, we looked in the yard for the clothes, but they were all gone. Somebody had stolen them. The people said that the baby had been robbed, and they gave abundance [25] clothing for that baby of every kind and description. It was a great event. I was in Gallipolis from the fall of 1843 to the fall of 1845, two years was the full term of itinerancy [“at that time” is written above the line]. It was an unusual thing to station a man at his first appointment, but I was not stationed on this circuit. I had for my presiding elder, John Faerre [presumably John Ferree]. He was an able man—a scholarly man. The General Conference of 1844 met in New York and passed resolutions saying that Bishop Andrews because of his connection with slavery, ought not to exercise the Episcopal prerogative. This brought on the great slave question, which resulted in a division of the church and the organization of the Methodist Episcopal church south. It was a great affliction to me. My connections and relations and friends, my associations in college life and elsewhere were largely in the south, and I was very much attached to the people of the south—myself and my family [“my family” is crossed out and “wife” is written above those words] were of general southern origin. I was born in Ohio. Gallipolis was only three or four miles below on the Ohio river, Point Pleasant, West Virginia. My wife and I were young & made a great many friends there and in Point Pleasant [“West Virginia” is written above the line], but after the action of the General Conference, virtually censuring Bishop Andrews, our friends in West Virginia, some of them would not speak to us for no other reason in the world except that we adhered to what they called the Northern church. It was the great [26] grief of my life,--the separation. It has been the great thought of my life to have a reunion of the M. E. church in the north and the M. E. church in the south. This Ecumenical Council just held in Washington City, looks towards peace and at least, co-operation in some sense, if not unity. I hope it might come. There lived in Gallipolis at that time the Hon. Samuel F. Vinton. He had been Speaker of the House of Representatives, and at the time I knew him he was Chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means. I had been speaking about the devision of the church. He told how these politicians worked to get the church divided. They thought it would be an easy thing to get the state divided, if the church was only divided, John C. Calhoun among them especially, was encouraging a division of the church. He gave the history of the rise and progress of extreme Calhounism and the result. His conversations as I remember them were pathetic. He portrayed the actions of the south, its purposes and desires. There was also in that town at that time a Judge Nash—a scholar. I often met him and had conversations with him. He was an eminent man; the author of a book called, “Morals and the State.” I had very pleasant relations wit the people of the village all the way through. At the close of that conference year in 1845, I was sent to Gallea circuit, which is the county of [27] Gallipolis. I did not enjoy the circuit. During the time that I was on the circuit my presiding elder John Ferre died. I lived in the country and on a large farm. The people were mostly Virginians and we had Virginian ideas of building houses and their homes. I wrote to Bishop Hamline of the death of my presiding elder and he visited me in my country home,--he and his wife. The people made a wood-chopping bee, brought their wives and provisions, and with their horses brought me in a great pile of wood. I enjoyed their visit very much. On the death of the Rev. J. Ferre, the Rev. James M. Jamison was appointed presiding elder. He was from the Missouri Conference. He would not go with the church south. I found him to be an eminent man, one of integrity, high-toned character and a scholar. He is still living in good health in Los Angelos, California, eighty-seven years old, but able to be about. He is a marvel. As I have said, I did not enjoy the circuit. I had been preaching in a station and preaching around the rest of the week in school-houses and farmhouses, which was not very enjoyable to me. The people wanted me very much, but I think they were glad to get rid of me, for I think I was not suited to that kind of work. I found here a large family of Charingtons and McCormacks. At the close of that conference year of 1840 I was sent to Athens, Ohio. Athens is the seat of the Ohio University. The Ohio [28] University had been a kind of asylum for Presbyterian preachers for years; it had some eminent men, but most of them inefficient. The trustees asked the Ohio conference to take charge of that institution. It did so and appointed William Howard, D. D. as professor in mathematics. The professors formed a very pleasant circle in the village. There lived at that time in that village Robert McCabe and his wife. His wife was conspicuous as a writer. She wrote a great deal for the Ladies’ Repository. Chaplain McCabe, correspondent of the Missionary Society was at that time about eleven years old. He has become famous since. I could mention Prof. Merrick; he is now and has been professor for thirty years in the Ohio Wesleyan, part of the time president of the university; an eminent man, one of learning and great piety. Several other men were there. Had very pleasant relations with the families of the Jewetts. The Hon. Calvary Morris, a brother of Bishop Morris, had made his home there. He had not been elected the last time and he was temporarily residing in Cincinnati in the Grocery business. He rented his homestead and a large plat of ground. He lived there for several years. My relations with the people of Athens was of the most agreeable nature. I enjoyed the pastorate of the church and enjoyed the people of the town. At the close of that year, that is 1846, I was elected Principal of Worthington Female Semi- [29] nary or college, which it was called afterwards. I only remained there for one year. My relations with those with me were not very pleasant and I did not enjoy teaching them and I resigned at the close of the first year and returned to the pastorate. Going back to Gallea circuit: At the end of that year, that is the conference year of 1846, my wife’s sister from Cincinnati visited us and Mrs. Boring went to Cincinnati while I went to conference; while there she was confined and Charles O. Boring was born—in October 1st, 1846. I was stationed then at Athens Female College. Afterwards I was stationed in Mariette, which is on the Ohio river at the junction of the Muskegon river. It is on the east bank of the Ohio river, and was the site of Mariette College, an institution in charge of the Congregationalists. Dr. Smith was its president, and the Rev. I. W. Andrews was one of the professors. I think that Andrews has been president of the college for years, and I think he is still living. I had as my family physician a Dr. Hildreth; he is the author of “Historical Sketches of Ohio.” With the professors of the college and the people of the city I enjoyed pleasant relations. I only remained there one year, and went from there to Newark, Ohio. While I was in Mariette, October 18th, 1848, my daughter Mrs. Augusta M. Boring Jones was born. I went to Newark in the fall of 1849. It was a little city [30] of three or four thousand inhabitants, and I spent two years there. They were very pleasant and successful years. I was there during the time when the Fugitive Slave law was passed. It was a democratic town and I had a great many democrats in my congregation. I delivered myself on the Fugitive Slave law, and said there were two ways of being a citizen; one was to obey the law; the other was to support the [blank space]. I gave notice that I would violate that law by feeding every hungry black or white who came to my house, and would give any colored man instructions how to fight his way to Canada by means of the north star. I supposed it would arouse great indignation, but it did not; people did not seem to pay any special attention to it. I was there two terms; once there in the fall of ’49, was there in 1850 and up to the fall of 1851. In the fall of 1851 I was stationed in Zanesville, Ohio, and had in my audience a superanuated preacher by the name of Rev. David Young, who figured largely in the church,--a severe critic on preachers, and I had for my colleague in another charge the Rev. Joseph M. Trimple. I was there only one year; at the close of that year I was sent to the Mariette district. Athens, Ohio was about the center of the district. I lived in both places. I enjoyed Athens so that I located my family there. I spent four years more there in the district. It was a large district, covering some six counties. I traveled chiefly on horseback; found it [31] very laborious but pleasant. They were successful years. The last year was remarkable for great revivals, and especially in the village of Athens there was a great revival. My first-born daughter was converted there. Rev. David H. Moore, D.D., father of Prof. Moore, then a young man, was the only son of a banker. His prospects were very good. I found him at what we called “the mourner’s bench”. He was in the sophomore or junior class. I inquired his state of mind; he said he came because I said he should. I asked him if he ever had thought if he became a Christian the Lord would want him to preach. He said he had. I asked him if he was willing; he said not; he had other plans in life. I said it was on the condition that he was to preach, that he would never experience any change of heart until he decided thus. I left him. Afterwards he said he had made up his mind to do it. He is now editor of the Wesleyan Christian Advocate in Cincinnati, Ohio. He has been president of the university at Denver, Col, occupying a very prominent position and preaching as very few men can preach. He is the father of Prof. Moore here. He was also president of the Female College in Cincinnati before he went to Denver. So I have a good many men whom I have influenced, who are preaching the gospel. As I intend this as a brief sketch for my family I will finish up my work in Ohio. At the close of the year which closed my work on the district in 1856, the district conference met in [32] Newark. My wife remained at home, she did not go with me. During the session of that conference Bishop Simpson who has resided here in Evanston, held the conference—the Rock River Conference at Aurora, Illinois, at the same time of the Ohio Conference. I received a telegram from Bishop Simpson to be transferred from the Ohio Conference to the Rock River Conference. I received a telegram also at the same time from four members of the Clark Street church,--Orrington Lunt, Judge Goodrich, Mr. Bigelow, and [blank space], asking me to become the pastor of the Clark Street church. Bishop Aimes would not transfer me, and stationed me at Lancaster, Ohio. It is an old town having many citizens of notoriety, among them the Hon. Thomas Ewing, ex-sanator and ex-secretary of the Interior. Also such men as McCracken, Hunter, and various others prominent. Hon. Medill was a cousin of Joseph Medill, who was a great democrat, and was for a time Comptroller of the U.S. Treasury. Many such men I met in Ohio. In the summer of that year I was one of the commissioners of the Ohio University at Delaware, and was made a member of the board of trustees for the time being. My wife had been here, and when I returned home I found a transfer from Bishop Aimes from the Ohio Conference to the Rock River Conference, a thing which I did not expect, which he had refused to do only a year before. The people were very kind in Lancaster, having bought for us a new parsonage which we [33] enjoyed and were enjoying pleasant relations, and the church was prospering when I was transferred to the Rock River Conference in 1857. When transferred to the Rock River conference of course I expected to come to Chicago. I had my goods shipped to Chicago; when I reached Chicago to my surprise I found I was stationed at Galena, out near the Mississippi river under Bishop Scott and under the influence of Bishop Ames. # # # # I want to return to Ohio and finish it up. I had for my presiding elder in Ohio for several years, I think eight of them, the Rev. Jacob Young. He was an old man but a wonderful man, wonderful in his intellect, peculiar in his manner of delivery, but a remarkable strong man. He was on the Mariette district, Ohio, in 1846, ’47, ’48, ’49. He was my presiding elder when I was first stationed in Athens, Ohio, and when I returned to the itineracy after resigning my position of the Female school, I was stationed at Marriete, which was the head of the district. He was my presiding elder there. He was my presiding elder when I was in Newark; he seemed to take me with him everywhere he went. I did not seem to be a great favorite with him, but wherever he went I went with him. He had filled a conspicuous place in the early western conference reaching back to the far-famed revival in Cane Ridge, Kentucky, in which the “jerks” manifested themselves. He [34] was associated with the earliest Methodism in Kentucky and Ohio, and was a remarkable man. When I was in Lancaster, Ohio, I had for my presiding elder a man younger than myself by the name of Daniel D. Mather. He was a good preacher, and [sic] able and interesting man. I was under him only one year; he lived in the same town with me—Lancaster. He had known me well for many years before I had been associated with him. He occupied most agreeable relations with all the preachers in Ohio. I spent fourteen years in Ohio Annual Conference. I have stated about my transfer to the Rock River Annual Conference and my station at Galena, Ill. I expected to be in Chicago, which I was asked for a year before, but I was sent to Galena. It was a very rough mountainous region. They had built a new church there, Bishop Ames had dedicated it. He was greatly interested in it, and the people interceded with him for a pastor, and he being an old friend of mine, recommended me, and wrote to C. C. Best, presiding elder of the district and to Bishop Scott to station me in Galena. We all were very much disappointed in being sent to Galena, Mrs. Boring especially. The parsonage and church were located on the same street on a hill one hundred twenty-five steps high; the parsonage was above the church. It was a very laborious business. The church was new and largely in debt. It had a good congregation. I staid there two years when I became very attached to the people and they professedly to me and [35] mine so that the mountainous region, the rough hilly country, became delightful to us. I met with a great many interesting people there. E. B. Washburn, Russel Jones, George W. Campbell, W. W. Huntingdon Wagner, Fiddicks, and others. At the conference held in Galena in 1859, Bishop Ames presided,--my old friend. He had an offer to Waukeegan and the people had asked me to be sent to them as their pastor, which he did. I came to Waukeegan in the fall of 1859, and found there a very interesting congregation. There had been a great revival there by a man by the name of McCag, and gathered everybody into the church. I made it my special attention to gather in the young people. I do not know but a few of the adults that were gathered in by McCag that are there now. Some of them died, most of them lapsed. In the spring, May, 1860, General Conference was held in Buffalo. Dr. Luke Hitchcock was my presiding elder on the Chicago district in 1850. He was a well-known man in the church; he is still alive, two months older than myself, actively employed as secretary of the Wesley Hospital. He was engaged at that time—May, 1860, as book-agent of the Wesleyan Book Concern, and Bishop Ames, who had charge of the district principally, appointed me in May, 1860, to fill out the unexpired term of Dr. Luke Hitchcock. I supplied Waukeegan with such men as Dr. Bannester, and Dr. Hemenway, until the close of the year. I was a new man in the conference and the [36] preachers of the conference as I had reason to know, did not receive it very well when I was appointed to the Chicago district. They did not make it unpleasant for me but showed that they wished a man in the Chicago district to have been appointed. Bishop Ames appointed me. # # # # I was appointed presiding elder to succeed Dr. Luke Hitchcock on the Chicago district and to fill out his unexpired term commending in 1859. I was pastor of church in Waukeegan from October nearly to the first of June. We had pleasant relations in Waukeegan. Some of the young people we did gather in the church are prominent men and women in the church now in different parts of the country, honoring god and doing good to men. I commenced my presiding-eldership the first Sunday in June, 1860. I had been appointed by Bishop Ames who had supervision of the conference at that time. I had some of the friends from the Ohio conference that were in the Rock River conference. For instance, Rev. W. F. Steward, who was then pastor of the Clark Street church in Chicago. I had known him from boyhood. I knew his father and mother intimately in Ohio and Kentucky. They were very dear friends of mine. Rev. John Steward was a superanuated member of the Ohio conference. He lived and died in Chicago. I attended his funeral. I subsequently attended the funeral of his wife since I have been living in Evanston. She also died in Chicago at the home of her [37] son. I found here also from the Ohio Annual Conference the Rev. Arza Brown, the father of Mrs. Isaac R. Hitt of Evanston. I had known him when he was a boy; he had often been to my mother’s house. I took care of his horse. He was a great favorite of mine. I knew him also in Ripley, Ohio, and while at Augusta College, being a local preacher I supplied the Ripley appointment a number of times. Arza Brown was a superanuated member of the Ohio Annual Conference, living wit his daughter in Chicago,--a man of great purity, gentleness and love. I was present at his death by request. I never witnessed a more triumphant death. He honored Christ in life, and Christ honored him in his death. His wife, the mother of Mrs. Hitt, died here in Evanston. I attended that funeral, but did not speak; I was requested to be there to give personal reminiscences of Mrs. Brown, but did not do it. While stationed in Galena I had been appointed by the Rock River conference an examiner of the school here,--Northwestern University in Evanston, which I attended in 1859 on the board of examination. Randolph S. Foster, now Bishop Foster, was its president. I knew him when he was thirteen years old. He had just been licensed to preach at thirteen years of age in 1833 when I made his acquaintance. He subsequently went for several years to Augusta college. He was there in advance of me, though I knew him when he was there. He did not graduate, but started and went out [38] a flame of fire to preach the word of God. Revivals attended him wherever he went; a man of marvelous power and purity of life, a dear friend, generous, kind, eminent as a preacher, and eminent as a writer. He occupied various positions before he became Bishop, and has been in every way a highly honorable and greatly successful minister of the Gospel. There was also here at that time Prof. Godman. I had known him when a young man in Ohio, and he succeeded me in the Worthington Female College as Principal or President. I found a great many other men from Ohio in and about Chicago. In the fall of 1858 the Rock River Conference was held in Waukeegan. By appointment I preached in the Wabash Avenue M. E. church in the city of Chicago. The Rev. Dr. John P. Derwin was to have been there and preached in the morning, but he did not put in an appearance, so I preached both morning and evening. I was the guest of the Hon. John L. Scrips, then managing editor of the Chicago Tribune. I made his acquaintance there, and that of his wife; then when I came on to the Chicago district I continued my very intimate relations with him and his family. He kept open house, a large purse and generous hospitality. He was an eminent man, eminent writer, scholar and politician; a Republican, of course, of the purest type. His family and my family became very intimate. He was a great favorite with my family. He was a great friend [39] of the young people, and especially of the young men. My son Charles O. Boring, was coming up to manhood, and he became greatly interested in John L. Scrips, and John L. Scrips in him. He was a great advocate of Lincoln’s nomination for the presidency, and had written up for the Tribune the great debate of his with Douglass. He was greatly enthused over Lincoln’s prospect of election and Lincoln’s election. Mr. Lincoln appointed him Postmaster of Chicago, he retaining his relation with the Tribune as one if its editors. He was a large stock-holder in the Chicago Tribune. At the time during the war when the rebels or copporheads had arranged to deliver Camp Douglass of the rebel prisoners, it was proposed (as known to many) to take possession of the city of Chicago, and get possession of the postoffice. Some one informed Mr. Scrips of the design of the rebels on him and on the postoffice, as well as all connected with him. He kept a turnout of course, and one evening his wife, himself, and children, two of them, came to our house, saying they wanted to spend the night with us. We inquired why; he said that night Camp Douglass was to be taken and the rebel prisoners let out, Chicago burned—the postoffice burned, his life was threatened and that of his family. He thought they would not visit us. The city was not visited by the mob, and it did not come to pass. Mrs. Scrips always entertained on New Year’s Day, and while sitting at the table talking [40] gaily, with Hon. John Wise Cammon and others, among them ex-Governor Dross, she suddenly fell over from heart disease and died. A carriage was sent immediately for Mrs. Boring and she went there and stair [sic] with the family until the burial. John L. Scrips himself became a subject to consumption in a few years and died way up in Minnesota far from his elegant home in a boarding house. The two children, George, and a little girl, Grace Scott Scrips; Grace Scrips attended the University here in Evanston and graduated. The son, George, went to Champaign and graduated there. They are both now living in Evanston. John L. Scrips had an elegant home, elegantly furnished; he had a fine artistic taste and filled his house with pictures, but when his estate was wound up everything was sold at auction at a sacrifice. The family, Mrs. Scrips especially, was very fond of my daughter Gussie; used to have her at their house a good deal. They all were at my house a good deal. At this time the Chicago University was running under full headway. Bishop Foster had resigned and somebody else was acting as president, whom I do not remember. Garrett Biblical Institute was under the management of that eminent man, Dr. John Dempster, who was president of the Institute at the time. He was a very great man, an eminent scholar and preacher—eminent in every department. There was also in the institution at that time Daniel P. Kidder, D. D., who has lately died in Evanston, Henry Bannister, [41] D. D., and that purest of men, F. D. Hemingway, D. D. I formed a very intimate acquaintance with the faculty of the University and Garrett Biblical Institute; was greatly interest [sic] in their behalf and have been every since up to the present time. There were a great many students in the University and the Institute that were looking to the ministry. They all received their license to preach that were authorized to preach by the Quarterly Conference at Evanston. I have authorized a great many of them to preach;--among others, Charles H. Fowler, now Bishop Fowler. He had just graduated and was mentioned by Simeon Fowler to be pastor of Jefferson Street church in the city of Chicago. I looked him over and thought he had eminent qualities and abilities and prospective great usefulness. By the request of the Financial Board he was licensed to preach in Evanston by the Jefferson Street Quarterly Conference and by that quarterly conference recommended to become the pastor of the Jefferson street church. I favored it, licensed him to preach and had him appointed as pastor. I doubted very much the propriety at first of his appointment to the place, but as the people were so anxious and were not willing to receive anybody else—any other member of the conference that they could get (there were many of the members they would receive, but could not get them), so they asked for the boy and he became their pastor. My family worshipped at Jefferson Street church. I lived at that [42] time as presiding elder, at No. 290 West Madison street. It was then almost the extreme part of the city. In my house, my parlor and dining-room made the largest hall there was in the neighborhood. Whenever Charles H. Fowler wanted a place for an entertainment for the church, a sociable, without consulting anybody he would announce it would be held at 290 West Madison; he knew that my wife would approve of it as of everything that he did. During his pastorate I received a very serious injury by a sprain in my knee, and my son, Charles O. Boring was dangerously ill with typhoid pneumonia. He was for many weeks on the border of death. I was called from my chamber in a crippled state three times to see him die, but he did not die. One Sunday morning a consultation was held over him. It was conducted by John M. Carr, who was the attending physician. He called in with him Dr. Car, Sen., Dr. Byford, and Dr. Beffin. The last one had been my family physician but Dr. Carr was attending my son. The verdict was that my son could not live through that day. They would not tell me because I was not able to bear the tidings, but they told my wife, and she said to them that he will not die, he is going to live. They told her she was a brave woman, but that they thought he would die likely before noon of that day. Charles H. Fowler called in Sunday morning before church; he was of course admitted to the chamber where my son was supposed to be by the learned faculty in a dying state. He sat down; they had a talk, and was soon recognized by [43] my son who liked him very much, and when Mr. Fowler (he was a D. D.) saw that he had his attention, told a story. (My son was very fond of stories, and fond of pets.) He told about a hen and rooster that he had, and how the rooster managed the hen; and that if the hen staid away too long he went and brought her back, and that he did everything when the chickens were hatched to take care of them. He said the rooster did everything to bring up the chicken, but lay the eggs, and he fairly groaned to do that. That was the climax. My son looked at him and laughed, and laughed, and laughed and broke out into a perspiration. He went away and did not say a word about religion, did not offer to pray; but that story saved my son’s life. Fowler had eventually succeeded; he saw what was needed and he probably told that story on Sunday morning in the dying chamber, and it was eventually the means of saving his life. He began to get better. Dr. Carr, his physician, came in about two o’clock expecting he would find him dead, but to his surprise he was getting better. He was a rough man and said, “Well, Charley, the devel has been after you, and nearly got you, but you beat him; you are getting better; you will get well now.” Indeed, it was a queer pastorly visit that was made in that dying chamber, and which resulted in his restoration to life and health. I found a great many eminent men in Chicago at that time. I found here in the Book Room of the Weslyan Book department, of [44] which Dr. Hitchcock was one of the agents,--I found here his cashier and manager, the Rev. Henry Whitehead, the father of William H. Whitehead, who recently moved from Erie, Ohio to Pennsylvania; he and his family. Rev. Arthur Edwards, D. D., editor of the Christian Advocate, married one daughter, with whom he is living at the present time. The Rev. Thomas M. Eddy, D. D. was then editor of the Weslyan Christian Advocate. I had known him for a great many years. I knew his father Augustus Eddy intimately from the time I was a young man. Thomas M. Eddy was a very attractive preacher as well as writer, very enthusiastic and greatly admired. We became very intimate friends. Dr. Hemingway, at my instance, was appointed to supply Clark Street church instead of James M. Baum who was pastor of the church; he was sent to India as missionary. During Dr. Hemingway’s pastorate his friend, Dr. Bradley became a subject of conversion. In the fall of 1860, O. H. Tiffany, D. D. had been appointed pastor of the Clark Street church. (Dr. Hemingway succeeded him here in Evanston for a number of years by my appointment. I found Dr. Tiffany to be an elegant orator, and eminent man. I have a great many personal recollections of O. H. Tiffany, D. D. He was very popular and very attractive as a preacher. He was subsequently pastor of a church here in Evanston for one year. He is now located in Minneapolis as pastor of the Hemingway M. E. church. During all these years [45] he and I have been most intimate and personal friends. I have many pleasant recollections of him. I found on coming to the district a man whom I dearly loved, early made his acquaintance, the Rev. Eligah Stone, now living in Ravenswood, a superanuated member of the Rock River conference—a true friend and genuine man. All these years we have intimately associated and dearly loved each other. He was to see me only the other day. (Oct. 15, 1891.) He had great strength of mind and force of character. Dr. Stone was the father of Prof. Norman Stone, astronomer of the Virginia University. He was one of the boys when I first knew his father. He is an eminent astronomer to-day in that institution, the Virginia University. He is also the father of Melville E. Stone, the originator of the Chicago News, who has succeeded as a journalist beyond many of his peers who started with him. Building up that great enterprise and making a fortune out of it in a few years; now retired, he sold out his interest in the institution, not all of his stock; but he is not editor no longer of it. He traveled extensively through Europe, taking his father and mother with him. He is now Vice-president of that new bank that has been started in Chicago,--I have forgotten the name of it. He pays great respect to his father. His brother has not succeeded in making much money but he has succeeded in making an eminent name as a scholar and an astronomer. Mrs. Stone, Eligah’s wife, is [46] a woman of decided character, and the boys take a great deal of the strength of mind from the mother. There was stationed in 1860 at the Wabash Avenue church a Henry Cox, D. D. He came there in 1859; was a man of ability. In 1861 I secured the transfer and appointment to Wabash Avenue of Robert Laird Collier, whom I had known in Dubuque, Iowa, while I was stationed in Galena. I thought well of him, and he succeeded admirably for a year, when he became tinctured with Unitarianism—was flattered by their attentions and finally embraced that form of belief and became pastor of the Church of Messiah. He disappointed me greatly in every way;--was not the man that I supposed he was at all. In 1860, Wilder McCabe, who had been pastor of the Jefferson Street church, at the close of the conference and after he had received his appointment, withdrew from the church and ministry and joined the Presbyterian church. I supplied the pulpit or the people did, for one year, by hiring such men as they could get,--T. D. Hemingway, Dr. Thomas Bannister, T. M. Eddie, then editor of the Northwestern Advocate, and others. In 1861, which I ought to have brought in, I appointed to that charge Charles H. Fowler. He showed strong mental character from the beginning. Some of the people were very much opposed to his coming there, that he was too young. Those men of brains, such men as A. E. Bishop, and Mr. Jordan and other eminent men there, laymen in the church, did not like the appointment. He introduced his ministry by preaching from the text, “There is [47] a lad here with five loaves and two fishes, and what are these for so many!” I did not hear the sermon but my wife and family did. It was unique, and these men who were opposed to his coming,--men of sense and character,--they turned to make the best of it; they had got the preacher, had him to support, and they were going to get all they could out of him, and they gave him a hearty welcome and acted like men of good sense, and he succeeded to admiration. He remained there two full years, which was the limit then of the pastorate in our church. I had him then appointed to the Clark Street church and he served that church for two years with eminent ability. Of course, he was a man of brains, great ability, and he supported himself, sustained himself, and sustained the church in every way. He was for a time President of Northwestern University; he is now Bishop Charles H. Fowler of the M. E. church, one of the first men of the church in the United States. On my part, his appointment to Jefferson and Clark Streets was not well approved of by many members of the Annual Conference; they thought that I was partial, and they did not receive it well, coming from me,--a new man in the conference,--in not recognizing the preachers of the conference in the appointments I had made, but the people approved of it, and it was an eminent success to the church and for the preacher. There were a great many eminent laymen in Chicago at that time, such men as Judge Grant Goodrich in [48] Clark Street, A. E. Bishop and a Mr. Jordan in Jefferson Street church; such men as J. K. Botsford, Bigelow Wheeler, and many others to numerous to mention. Among them all was a queer layman, found to be a great character, of great strength of mind and widespread influence. Why, there were so many I cannot mention them all. When I came to the district in 1860 to succeed Dr. Luke Hitchcock, there had been a committee appointed to select grounds for a camp-meeting. Camp-meetings were not as a rule in great favor among the people about Chicago. There were only a few ardent friends in the city and in the country who were very favorable towards a camp-meeting. Many laymen did not like it at all. They wanted to support their local church and they did not like anything that divided its interest and diverted its attention for a moment from the local churches. I soon became acquainted with the committee. As presiding elder of the district I was therefore chairman of that committee. I met with the committee and we looked several places over. I was living at the time in the parsonage in Waukeegan, and remained there until the fall of 1860. I commenced my presiding eldership in June, as I have stated. Of course I was very favorable to the lake-shore. There was a place that I was very much pleased with near Lake Bluff, a little north. The ground was owned by the same man who sold a good deal of the property to the Lake Bluff Association. But I was more favorable to Winnetka on the lake-shore, and I looked over the ground and saw that I could buy [49] on the lake shore one hundred acres of land for one hundred dollars an acre: ten thousand dollars. I was very anxious that the camp-meeting should be located on the lake-shore and especially near Winnetka, but the laymen, those that had the money, did not approve of a camp-meeting at all scarcely, and did not want it located at Winnetka. Of course, as I saw it then and see it now, it was a big mistake not to have had it at Winnetka. The ground is exceedingly valuable now and the camp-meeting corporation would have been very rich in money if not in success as a spiritual matter. There were a good many laymen in the church, such men as Joseph B. Kennicut, and others, of large influence, who wanted it on the Desplaines [ Des Plaines] river; a good many of the people in the city were of the same mind. A committee met accordingly, looked the ground over and took a free ground from Squire Rand of Desplaines, and occupied a portion of his land for camp-meeting purposes. He was not a Christian man, but was generous and kind; and we accordingly located the grounds near a spring of water and near the Desplaines river. Our first camp-meeting was held in August, 1860. I secured all the help I could for a camp-meeting among the ministers: Bishop Simpson was then residing in Evanston. He was in hearty sympathy with the camp-meeting, and gave it his moral support. He attended the camp-meeting and gave a great deal of help, a great deal of instruction—instruction to me and others about the management of [50] camp-meetings. I had a large experience in Ohio in the management of camp-meetings of which Bishop Simpson knew. Our first meeting was largely attended. The tents were extemporized of canvas, board tents, everything was temporary and impromptu. The Northwestern Railroad gave us great favors, dividing and sharing in the transportation which was a means of support to the camp-meeting. I secured that by personal application to the superintendent of the road, George L. Dunlap, and he was also very favorable towards the camp-meeting. We had four preaching services a day then. On the first Sunday, as the presiding officer I preached at nine o’clock in the morning. During the closing part of my sermon, which received marked attention to say the least of it, I think fifteen hundred people came on the grounds, by rail and wagons, and perhaps there were more. Bishop Simpson preached at eleven o’clock or at half past ten, and he preached that remarkable sermon on the discoveries of faith. I think that from four to six thousand people, I do not know the exact number, heard him preach. I never heard such a sermon from any man before nor since. The whole audience was transfixed during the whole time of its delivery. It was a marked and marvelous success and the camp-meeting was a marked success. I never had known of any camp-meeting, (and I lived in a region where camp-meetings were popular and well attended, and I had attended a good many myself in Ohio,) but I never had known of a [51] distinctive childrens’ meeting at any camp-meeting. A little girl came to me on Thursday or Friday, (the camp-meeting commenced on Wednesday,) and said to me, “Mr. Boring, can’t we have a Sunday-school in the afternoon, Sunday or Friday?” Yes, I answered, you can have it. I will give it out for you and appoint a leader. Which I did that afternoon and appointed to lead it for that afternoon, Albert G. Lane, now superintendent of Public Instruction in the city of Chicago. Albert G. Lane was then quite a young man, perhaps not more than eighteen years of age, and was principal of one of the schools in the city. He has been a marked success from the very commencement and all the way along has maintained a firm Christian character. He has been for many years superintendent of public schools of Cook County. He occupies a high and honorable position. The next meeting on Friday I appointed A. B. Curtis to lead the meeting, and he did it with marked success. I also appointed Seth Bradley, who lead the meeting. I had a choir of many singers, male and female voices, and the music was lead by Frank Lumbard. He was just then commencing his career as a singer, not a Christian man at all, but a great leader of music. He collected about him a number of singers and he sang the old hymns of Charles and John Wesley with a pathos that I never heard excelled; he seemed to bring out the meaning of every word and every syllable of every [52] word, and I never heard better music at any meeting of any kind in my life. Many people thought it strange that I should allow an irreligious man to be the leader of sacred music on a camp-meeting ground, but I didn’t and it met the approbation of the people and everybody enjoyed it. Prominent among those who attended the camp-meeting at that time was John L. Beverage, since General, and Congressman. He was then making his home in Evanston and has made it his home ever since, until quite recently. His wife was the daughter of Rev. Philo Judson, a superanuated member of the Rock River Conference, and has been well known in the community as a Christian man. He became a subject of conversion professedly at that first camp-meeting. That camp-meeting was attended with wonderful power. People were converted by scores and by hundreds in the old fashioned way. Having known John L. Scrips of the Chicago Tribune, I asked him if he would publish an account of the camp-meeting if I would furnish it to him, and he said he would. John L. Scrips had been brought up in the M. E. church and was familiar with its doctrines and usages, of which I had spoken before. I appointed a William P. Morse to be the representative and correspondent of the Chicago Tribune, assisted by the Rev. Joseph H. Leonard, then chaplain of the Seamen’s Bethel in Chicago. Those parties gave a true and faithful account of the camp-meeting and it was really photographed in the Chicago Tribune. Of course [53] it had a wide notoriety—very extensive. I conducted on that ground under my presiding eldership four camp-meetings. A man by the name of S. B. Keys succeeded me on the district in 1863. He was not much of a camp-meeting man and he made me the leader again of the camp-meeting. We held five camp-meetings on that ground, which was known as Squire Rand’s. A committee was appointed to look up grounds to purchase, as we had about worn out the welcome with Squire Rand. In one of his good moods he had given me a lease for ninety-nine years, the consideration being one dollar. I never had it recorded. I saw he was satisfied and I let it lapse. The committee looked up and purchased the grounds now known as the Desplaines Camp-meeting grounds on the Desplaines river near the station or village of Desplaines. I superintended on the present location, and assisted four more camp-meetings, so that I was really superintendent of the Desplaines camp-meeting for at least on my own account nine (9) years. Nine camp-meetings I assisted with many others. I have preached at the opening, or the opening sermon of all the camp-meetings but this one, I think, from the commencement in 1860. I was appointed to preach the opening sermon in July of this year. I did not think I could do it, but I let the appointment be made. I did not reach there in time to try it. I occupied the pulpit for some ten minutes; being in feeble health it was all I could say. Then I was taken with [54] eczema. I was there only a part of one day. The camp-meetings have been a wonderful success. From the beginning it has emphasized the importance of awakening the sinner. The law was preached and the love of God was preached. Convictions were thorough, and everything was conducted as to make that camp-meeting the exponent of high religious experience. It is known wonderfully throughout the Christian world as the place where God has marvelously worked for the glorification of His name. For many years T. C. Hoag of the village of Evanston has been president of the board of trustees. He has given his personal attention to the camp-meeting and has been instrumental in the promotion of it financially especially, as well as spiritually, but more particularly financially. Many other laymen have been zealous in the promotion of the camp-meeting. For example, a James H. Manny has been very prominent as a leader, and as a layman on the board of trustees. Well, perhaps that is all I know about the Desplaines camp-meeting. I closed my term of presiding eldership in 1863. I was then solicited by Bishop Scott to take what was known as the St. Charles district, subsequently the Aurora district. As my children went to school in the city, and preferred to live in the house in which I had lived, and so I took the Desplaines station,--a feeble church of no great notoriety and became pastor of that church, and as a part of it, a mission on [55] 12th street. I enjoyed the people at Desplaines; they were plain people, a laboring people, most of them were English people. There was an English family by the name of Drake there. George Drake was the local preacher and class leader. He was a class leader in England before he came here, and altogether he was a class leader for fifteen years. He was a painter by trade, a man of reading, thought, and a good painter. The family have been greatly endeared to us all the way down. He has recently died. He had a son Alexander, who was a very prominent and popular man. I was there among those English people for one year only. Of course I greatly enjoyed my pastorate among them, and continued to live in the house I had lived in,--290 West Madison. During the summer of 1864, by some means or other, my attention had been called for me to become the financial secretary of the Chicago Home for the Friendless, and concerning which I knew very little, comparatively nothing of it. At that time William Blair was vice-president, and acted as president, and Jonathan Burr, a Unitarian, was corresponding secretary. They made me fine offers. As I want4ed to stay in the city and complete the education of my children, I accepted the situation of corresponding secretary of the Chicago Home for the Friendless. I traveled extensively in northern Illinois and in Wisconsin, securing funds and means of support for the institution. I was the executive officer of the board, which was made up largely [56] of females. Prominent among the managers of that institution was a Mrs. Jane Hauge, and a Mrs. Mary Livermore, a woman of national reputation. They were the managers of the sanitary commission during the war, in Chicago, and made of that commission a great and marked success. There were many other prominent women. I could name a Mrs. F. D. Fray. She was a Presbyterian. There were not a great many Methodists in the management. They were made up of Unitarians, Presbyterians and Episcopalians, and a few Methodists. It was a non-sectarian institution. I had sent a great many children into homes which I had selected for them or the people had selected for them. I think I signed indentures of at least one thousand children who were put out into the country. I never did better work for Christ and the church than I did during my secretaryship for the Home for the Friendless. I resigned the place in 1859 and became pastor of what was then known as Grant Place M. E. church. It was a new church—a new enterprise, and unfinished. I occupied for the time being the basement. It was a new locality on the North side near Lincoln Park. It was a marked success from the beginning, and we finished up the audience room during my stay with it. I had associated with me the Rev. John A. Reed, D. D., then editor of the Northwestern Christian Advocate, who lived in that neighborhood and gave his personal attention to that interest. I was there only for one year. During that year [57] Jonathan Burr died and left a large bequest to the Chicago Home for the Friendless. At the earnest solicitation of the board of managers, especially the vice-president, F. P. Gray, I was re-elected corresponding secretary, and returned to the supervision of the Home for the Friendless. My family continued to live near Lincoln Park, just in front of Lincoln Park. It was a beautiful situation and we did not want to move and did not move. I resided there with my family and the Rev. Charles G. Truesdall, D. D. late presiding elder of the Chicago district, who succeeded me in the pastorate of Grant Place church. My family remained in the church. I gave him a hearty welcome and earnest support. At the late camp-meeting in referring to me he made special mention that I had been his predecessor and had given him my warmest sympathy and support. It [sic] thought it was right to give my heartiest support to the preacher in charge of the church where my family attended. I never found fault with him and never allowed the people to find fault with him in my hearing, and whatever he might do that might be questioned, the people never heard that I disapproved what the pastor did. It has been the rule of my life to support the pastor where my family worshipped and where I had my membership. # # # # I want to go back to my experience in Ohio, gathering up some things that I had forgotten which I think are worth mention- [58] ing. I carried on a saddler-shop at Williamsburg, Ohio, as I have before stated. It was an old village, once the county seat of Claremont County, and a great many families who had become eminent, made their homes there. It is the home or was, of the Raper family. William H. Raper became a distinguished minister in the Methodist church, occupying most honorable positions everywhere. think I have spoken of the Rev. Isaac C. Hunter, who was pastor of the church while I lived there; an eminent man. And then it was the home of the Carys, a very large family, and of the Skinkes; there were several of them. Bishop Foster was a relative of the Skinkes, and his middle initial was S. There was a tanner there by the name of Bosler Hover [Hoover]. He had a great influence over me in stimulating me to study and read; he talked with me a great deal. I saw there the first copy I had ever seen of the National Era. I received great excitement and stimulus from him. I have stated it was the home of the Swing family; Prof. Seing’s [sic] mother lived there, and Prof. Swing told me only a short time ago, that this same Hoover had been a great stimulus to him in his boyhood days. He was a great philanthropist and paid great attention to men and boys, and had a great influence over them. I want to speak of some men that I met of distinguished reputation elsewhere. I met in Zanesville Mrs. Bishop Hamline, the mother of Dr. Hamline. She was a cripple and was married to L. L. Hamline before he became a Christian. She was a rich woman and the Doctor’s property in Chicago, came from her. It was the home of the Bursches. Daniel D. Bursche lived there; he was a banker and a member of the church. He was the father of the distinguished minister George W. Bursche. George W. Burshe had been my colleague in Newark, Ohio. He was a man of talents, great ability. I have heard him preach as good sermons as I have heard anybody preach. When at college he had formed the habit of drinking some. There seemed to be a strong tendency in his nature in that direction. He then left off drinking and used morphine instead. I was remarkably fond of him and when I was presiding elder of the Marriette district, I brought him to Mariette, which was a seat of learning, and I thought he would command attention and respect from everybody, but I was disappointed in him. He seemed to have greatly changed from the time when I knew him to the time when I brought him to supply at Mariette. The people were disappointed. He told me one day that he was struggling with the habit of drink, scarcely could pass a saloon without rushing in and drinking; that he had substituted morphine and that he was trying to quit that. He went on, however, was stationed in Delaware, Ohio, and there with the force of that bad habit, ended his life by his own hands,--a very sad event to me. In Zanesville, Ohio, I had a friend by the name of James Austin, and a large family of Coxes lived there, one of them a superanuated preacher; and I became acquainted with S. S. Cox, known as “Sunset” Cox; his family lived there and I knew him there. There were others but I wont mention them now. I will return to Marriette, Ohio. There were a great many families there that I was very fond of. There was Mrs. Curtis, who had a family of daughters and a son. I thought much of her. There was a Rufus Bigimus in Marriette, Ohio, and a George W. Woodbridge, James Dunn, and others. Just across the river from Marriette was Harmer,--across the Muskeegon river. There were several families of Barbers there. Levi P. Barber I was very fond of. Used to make my home there whenever I went to the place, unless invited elsewhere. There was a family of McCoys, whose son became distinguished as a minister, and living now in Bloomington. I secured his recommendation to a conference. There was John Crawford, a local preacher, one of the best men I ever knew. There was in that same county—Washington County, near Marriette, two families by the name of Lawton, James Lawton and his brother Richard Lawton. James Lawton was a farmer and had a large library, was a man of fine reading habits, well posted in English literature and knew the religion and politics of the day. He had an open house to preachers, was very generous, and I used to stop with him a great deal. His brother Richard was a scientist; was a farmer but used to work in science as well, in which he was as well informed [61] as any man I have met out of the professor’s chair. He used to want me to stay with him a great deal. I never liked to on one account. He knew I was a graduate of a college and supposed naturally that I was a scholar and well-versed in scientific terms, which I was not, and when he talked to me, he talked in scientific language, and I had to ask him to explain, which was not very satisfactory to me or him. On the Hocking river there were three large families, the Stuarts, I have mentioned them before, where the Rev. John S. Stuart came from, and the Hon. John W. Stuart, and his brother, the Rev. William V. Stuart. There was a large family of the Pilchers, out of which came Elijah H. Pilcher and Henry E. Pilcher, and a Pilcher who is now missionary in China. These are prominent and marked families in that valley. I want to say a word about Lancaster, Ohio. I had a great many friends there in the families of the Pierces, in the families of the Risings and other families. I want to mention especially a George Kauffner, a druggist, a marked man, a man of learning and of a fine family. He showed me many favors. His sons, he had two, settled in Columbus, Ohio. One of them now is Professor of chemistry in the Ohio University at Columbus. The widow of George Kauffner was a great friend of my wife and myself; she now resides in Columbus. She has kept up a correspondence with me until within the last year, ever since we left Lancaster. [62] Now I want to go back to Galena, Illinois, my maiden appointment in Illinois. A man lived there at that time by the name of John A. Packard. He was a wholesale merchant and carried on a large business in dry goods in that place. I found out through the business of the Grant tannery that that was the place where they sold their goods. Jesse R. Grant, the father of General Grant, never divided his estate until all his death, kep it together in his own name. He had a son, Simpson Grant who was located at Galena. I had known him when a boy, as I did the General, and I was surprised to find him there. I found there also a man whom I had known in Gallipolis, Ohio, by the name of Parker; he was the owner of a steamboat. He invited myself and family to an excursion on his boat to St. Paul and return. That was in 1858. We accepted the invitation, and my wife, children and myself all went on his boat as invited guests to St. Paul and return. Among the first things I met on the trip up the rive, (it was in June when the moon was full,) was the remarkable beauty of the river. I have been on the Hudson river in New York, and I have traveled up the Mississippi river from Galena to St. Paul and return. From La Crosse to Winona on the upper Mississippi I never saw handsomer scenery. The scenery on the Hudson is grand, but the scenery on the upper Mississippi is beautiful, the very beau ideal of the beautiful. On reaching St. Paul we found ox trains from the Wind river of the north with some Indians, who had come [63] to trade in St. Paul. Each cart was made for one ox. They had several teams in the caravan—how many I do not know—but there was not a nail in the carts, nor a partical of grease on the axle-trees,--innocent of nails, iron, or oil. It made a great noise. Their harness was also innocent of any iron—bound together by thongs. My family and I admired the train; it was an event in their lives and ours. I have spoken in a general way of John A. Packard. We became intimate and warm friends. He had a special home in Southern California, where he has a fruit ranch and a beautiful home. He is not a member of the church, but his wife is. There lived in my family in Galena a girl who was a half orphan, by the name of Elizabeth James. She came to stay with us but for two weeks, but remained with us two years. She did not talk about going away, neither did any of us. She is married now and lives in South Evanston. She is the wife of Lamberson, well-known in this community. We were very fond of her. There lived also in Galena at that time a man by the name of S. W. Swift. He was a painter, and had a crooked face. He and two men by the names of Wagoner and Huntingdon were the first to meet us when we reached Galena. They were looking for us and met us at the depot, and entertained us at the De Soto House until we could be located in the parsonage. I should make special mention of that Swift family. S. W. Swift is that father of the Hon. [64] George B. Swift, now general manager of Frazier’s Lubricating Co. he resides in Chicago, and since their removal there six me4mbers of the family have died. S. W. Swift died several years ago; three daughters and recently his wife died, all within a year. I have attended the funeral of all the members who have died in that family. There are but four left out of a family of ten, two sons and daughters. We held most intimate relations with them and kept it up. I want to speak in detail of the Fiddick families. William Fiddick was a leading merchant, associated with his nephew in the city of Galena; he had nearly everything in his store,--dry goods, shoes, etc. He was not a member of the church but a constant attendant, a means of grace and support to the church. His wife’s name was Phillipi. When Mrs. Boring and I returned to Galena, William Fiddick entertained us, and we were the guests of the family many times since we lived in Gelena. There was a John Fiddick. He was a partner of William’s, a well-known man. He is now in the same business, has become rich. William Fiddick had an adopted son by the name of Henry. Henry has now come to be a man, and is a leading merchant in the place. There was a Charles Botts that was remarkably kind to us while we lived there, and there was a large family of Whitoms, who had been miners at an early day. The old man suddenly became rich [65] from being very poor—so poor that he could not get credit for a pound of nail; but he got the nails some where else, and the next morning it was said about that he had made a discovery and was worth One Hundred Fifty Thousand dollars. Then everybody wanted to credit him, but he would not ask credit of them. There was another family of miners; a Mr. Samuel Highlett. He was not a Christian man, but a man of the world, was called a wicked man, was profane and had been given to drinking. He has since quit that. He was a rich man, one of the board of trustees in my church, as well as John A. Packard and William Fiddick, none of whom were member of the church. Hughlett was not much of a Christian, but was a great Methodist,--not a Christian man at all. A Richard Barrett whom I found and brought into the church is a merchant and is still in business there to-day. Concerning the Waggoner family of whom I have spoken: Joseph Wagoner was a book-seller at the time in Galena; he had a most excellent wife and quite a large family of children. There was a family there that gave us great attention by the name of Collins—George Collins. I was very fond of his wife and his wife’s mother; they were very pleasant people. The Galena people are noted for sticking together, especially when they are away from home. People who have lived in Galena are usually very [66] fond of each other and retained that fondness. I heard an amusing anecdote by George P. Swift concerning that fact. Gen. Grant made his home in Galena, came there to work in the shop with his brother who was the head of the house, as a clerk on seventy dollars a month. He came to Galena in 1859, just as I was leaving the place for Waukeegan, Wisconsin. I had known him when a boy, but did not know him at least when he came there. (There were families by the name of Smith. John A. Smith, who figures [sic] in the late war, and Gen. John C. Smith who figured quite prominently in the late war and was at one time a Treasury or Interior official. He has occupied various positions of trust. There was a Maltby, who figured conspicuously at the taking of Vicksburg. There is a family I want to mention especially, John Rawlins. He was quite a fine lawyer, a man of broad mind and attainments. He had a pew in my church and was a constant worshiper.) I return now to the story that I was about to tell on Gen. Grant as heard by George P. Swift. After the battle of Belmont, one of the first battles that Grant conducted on his own account, I was waiting in the cars with George P. Swift. I did not hear the story, but he said to me as I sat beside him, “Did you hear that?” “No, I didn’t.” “What is it?” “Some person told a story about Grant’s achieving success at Donaldson.” A man started up and said, “Who told that?” Such a name was mentioned, I did not hear the name. He is from Galena, [67] is he not?” Being answered in the affirmative, he said? “Well, these Galena people of all people in the world stick together. They will lie, steal and swear right a long for each other, such is the tenacity of friendship formed by the people of Galena.” John A. Rollins became Grant’s first aide, his chief man, a member of Grant’s staff and occupied that position nearly all along through the war. John A. Rollins was to Gen. Grant what Stanton was to Lincoln, only more so. He was an eminent scholar and distinguished throughout the war. I had known Grant as a little boy when he was not very fond of any kind of learning but arithmetic and algebra. I did not suppose that Gen. Grant was much of a speaker or writer either. When John A. Rollins had become Gen. John A. Rollins and visited Chicago, speaking about some of Grant’s dispatches, their explicitness, I said, “Gen. Rollins, I knew Grant when he was a boy; did you not write those dispatches instead of Grant?” Said I, “I supposed you did. You can tell me.” “Well,” said he, “Gen. Grant wrote his own dispatches. He never asked anybody to write any. He would write those dispatches in the midst of a war council, surrounded by a number of his generals and send them off without correcting;” eminent as a writer, at which I was surp[rised]. Speaking of Gen. Grant, I have stated that S. W. Swift had moved to Chicago and carried on the paint business here. After [68] the war when Gen. Grant returned covered with renown and glory, he visited Chicago, and visited the Sanitary Fair, and riding his famous horse down Clark Street, he saw on the corner of Clark and Washington streets his old friend S. W. Swift standing on the sidewalk with his painter’s clothes on him, watching the procession. Gen. Grant stopped his horse, got off, walked through the crowd, up on to the sidewalk to speak to his old friend. Gen. Grant never forgot a name nor the face of any one he met, so far as I know. My wife Rebecca knew Grant when he was a boy. She had not seen him since he was seventeen years old until he came into the Sanitary Fair after the close of the war. Mrs. Boring was identified with the Fair, which was being held for the benefit of the soldiers at the close of the war. She occupied a booth there. She did not seek to know Gen. Grant; she did not press her way through the crowd to recognize him. He received great attention, and the crowd was so dense that he could not get along without their opening a way for him. When he came to a little counter, he put his hand on it and jumped over the counter for the purpose of protecting himself, and as soon as he alaighted on his feet he saw Mrs. Boring, he cried out, “Why, Rebecca, is that you! I am so glad to see you”, and he saluted her with the warmest friendship and with many kisses to the surprise of all about him. He had seen her when he was a little boy seventeen years of age, yet he had never forgotten her. I could tell many things bout him, but there [69] was one incident which I wish to relate that shows the character of Gen. And Mrs. Grant. Mrs. Boring’s family and Mrs. Grant’s family were remotely connected and inter-married, and of course Mrs. Boring was well-known to Mrs. Grant: She and I called on Mrs. Mrs. Grant in Chicago at the Tremont House. I came down into the parlor and met Mrs. Gov. Evans of Colorado and Mrs. Orrington Lunt, who were sisters. They asked me if I was acquainted with Mrs. Grant. I said I was. “Can you get us an audience with her?” they asked. I said I would see. I went up to her room and asked her if she would see them. She said she would. I asked her where, and she said in her room. I came down and went up with them. They had a quilt with them, quilted and furnished by the ladies of the Methodist Church, which they wished to present to her. In a very modest way one of them, I think Mrs. Evans, presented it to Mrs. Grant. One of the party speaking said to Mrs. Grant, “You have been in Chicago frequently, have you not?” “Oh, no, this is my first visit here; I was never here before.” “Why,” said the party, “we supposed you visited here frequently.” “No,” she said, “my husband only got seventy dollars per month and could not afford to let me visit even as far as Chicago.” Regarding Waukeegan. I found there some men that I became very fond of. An Hon. A. S. Sherman, who has moved to Chicago, and once mayor of Chicago. I found there a J. D. Brown [70] with whom we formed a very intimate connection and still hold that connection. He still lives in Chicago. His daughter and my daughter Gussie are warm and personal friends. I found there a N. J. Brown, a lumber merchant in Chicago; he had failed in business and was living at home reading Sir William Hamilton and playing on the organ. He was the organist of the church and a class leader, and one of the best class leaders I ever knew. I also formed the acquaintance of Aaron Smith, a Mr. Johnson, Charles B. George, Squire Turner, and many others that I do not call up now. # # # # As I have stated before I had resigned my position as corresponding secretary of the Chicago Home for the Friendless, and take charge of Grant Place. The Rev. William C. Dandy, D. D. was presiding elder of the district at the time. Dr. Dandy and I had been at college at the same time. He was younger in years than I. He showed at school much strength of mind and vigor of character. He joined the Kentucky conference in 1841, and consequently he was there at the time of the great division and went with the M. E. church south. He occupied various positions of honor and trust in that conference, was wonderfully successful as a preacher. Many times a presiding elder he was also a delegate to the general conference, perhaps more than once. He came to a place in their [71] conference that he and some seventeen others declined to go with the M. E. church south in certain measures, which resulted in his withdrawal from the M. E. church south and connecting himself with the M. E. church north and coming to Chicago he joined the Rock River conference. He was pastor of the Clark Street church for one year, I think, and also of the Evanston M. E. church one year. He then was appointed presiding elder on the Chicago district and remained there for a term of four years, giving admirable success in his work. He was an eminent man, and is now my successor as corresponding secretary of the Rock River Superanuates’ Relief Association, and is making a good success of that work. In the summer of 1871, I was elected again corresponding secretary of the Chicago Home for the Friendless. Jonathan Burr had died and left a large bequest to that institution, and F. D. Gray, president of the Home, and many others urged that I should be elected and take charge of that institution again. The reason assigned was that large property had come to the Home, and F. D. Gray, after having been associated with him for five years, said that I would not steal, so he wanted me, as well as the majority of the Board to resume work, which I did. The Rev. C. G. Truesdall of the Iowa Annual Conference had been sought as my successor in Grant Place M. E. church. He accepted the invitation, was transferred and appointed to that charge. I continued to live on the [72] north side in the bounds of his charge; my family was connected with the church after I had resigned and had returned as corresponding secretary for the Chicago Home for the Friendless. The audience room of the church had been under process of finishing and furnishing while I was connected with the church, and which was completed under the charge of C. G. Truesdall. I gave him my earnest support and hearty co-operation, a thing that I did to all the pastors where my family worshipped, without criticizing or finding any fault, or encouraging anybody else to do it. I was living on the North side of Franklin Street, it was called then, just in front of the improved part of Lincoln Park. My family resided there and I traveled for the Home for the Friendless. In October, 1871, the time of the great fire I was in McHenry County, on the Sunday of the fire. I came down on the cars to the Junction with the Northwestern at Crystal Lake or Nunda. From the telegraph operator I learned early on Monday morning of the great fire. It was a thing talked of on the cars; there were many Chicago men and women on the cars at the time. When I reached Chicago Avenue coming into the city, the cars stopped and I got off. I came to the bridge on Chicago Avenue and was told by the policeman that I could not get through so dense was the crowd. I told him my family lived over there, so he opened the way and took me over the bridge. The bridge was crowded with vehicles, men and women, and goods of every kind. There was no noise; it was the stillness of death. The fire was raging some two blocks south of Chicago Avenue at the time. I meandered around the streets sometime and went around the fire and reached my home in front of Lincoln Park. My daughter Laura Jane, since deceased, was the first to meet me, and said, “pa, all may go now, we are all safe.” I went into the house and found that my son Charles had gone out in pursuit of me, and he ran a great risk in the fire, running in several depots to find me. He finally returned home and all were safe. I thought for many hours that we would not be consumed by the fire, and my folks fed everybody that came along, and my son and son-in-law assisted everybody else that wanted to go. Finally I concluded that the fire was likely to reach us, and I said to my son, “Have you made any arrangements to get away from here. He said a Mr. M. E. Page, a confectioner, had been to our house with his family early in the morning to get his breakfast, and said he would come and take us away. I asked him where he was, and he answered, “Down near the lake.” He went out in search of a team. I went to Major McDowell, now of this village. He was in my church. He had charge of a iron works, and a number of teams in his employ; said he was sick but would get up and go after me. On my way back home I stipulated with a teamster to come and take me away at fifty dollars an hour. [74] I had just five dollars in my pocket, but I had money enough in the bank for all practical purposes if I ever could get it out. I thought I could. When I returned home to my house, this hired team had just come in, and Major McDowell drove up with another team; then a friend, Mr. Pratt, came with his horse and buggy, and also another friend with horse and buggy. The latter one said to me, “Elder, take this horse and buggy, if we live after the fire you can give them back to me, if you do not, why, let it go.” Having two buggies and Major McDowell’s team, just then one of Mr. M. F. Page’s teams returned, so that we had two wagons and two buggies to get away in. I let my neighbor have a team, the one that I had hired at fifty dollars an hour to move him away. That saved my standing financially with that teamster. My neighbor lived next door to me, a young married man; he had a well furnished house. He loaded up that wagon with the choisest articles and started with it for the prairies. Three times he was burned out. The next morning he and his wife came to Evanston with all they had left tied up in two pocket handkerchiefs. M. E. Page’s team and Major McDowell’s team, and those of the friends carried away as much as they could in the afternoon of Monday of the great fire. They carried away my stuff until the fire began to burn in the block in which I lived. They succeeded in carrying away a great deal of my furniture of one kind and another, about two-thirds of [75] my library. We moved that night. The fire commenced in that block three times; first in one place and then in another until we got out to John Turner’s Sen. Place. He had moved out there with his family, his house on Michigan Avenue and barns and everything having been burned up. My family got into the carriages that were loaned to us, and Mr. John Turner, Jr., with his team and wagon carried a load of my goods out to his house. Mr. Turner lived near Ravenswood on Lincoln Avenue on the Northwestern rail road. At two o’clock on Tuesday morning, after having watched the fire until after midnight, my family with some twenty others laid down on the floor in Mrs. Turner’s home, all alive. It was the happiest moment in my life. My property was gone, but my family was all alive, and life was the only thing that seemed worth anything to me at the time. I was in a state of ecstasy, of excessive joy over the event. We remained there that night. The next morning we had nothing but potatoes and tea for breakfast. I had taken out some tea in the load with Mr. Turner’s, and he had the potatoes, and we had breakfast on that. We returned to the city at the invitation of Mr. And Mrs. Augustus Pratt, on Webster Avenue we made our home for a few days. During the time that my family was at Mr. Pratt’s, I attended the annual conference in Aurora for seven days. I had burned up in the fire most of our furniture and a great many of our clothes and about two-thirds of my library with all my sketches and many notes and sermons and minutes of events, the names of all [76] the persons I had licensed to preach as presiding elder, and all the charges that I had served, which represented about thirty years of labor and toil. I had hoped to publish a volume of sermons, many of which I had prepared with care, and it was about ready; when I reached the place when I had enough to place in the printer’s hand, all manuscripts, all my sketches and my sermons, all the minutes of my life—as I have stated, thirty years of work,--save what I have retained in my memory, were consumed in the great fire. The events of the great fire are well-known to my children. They were a party to it and knew all about it,--a very eventful period. I shall never see anything like that great fire again until I shall see the fires that shall consume the world in the last day. The question was, what to do in the midst of that great fire. Our home was burned,--our hired house,--much of our furniture. I had insured my house-hold goods in the Chicago Fire and Insurance Company only the Friday before the great fire. I took out a policy of fifteen hundred dollars on my house-hold furniture and library. I received on the valuation that the company made nine hundred dollars instead of fifteen hundred; I had something left. I received 4% insurance of that, a mere trifle. Everything was in ashes, all about us was consumed; no houses to rent, and I, by the request of the people, was re-appointed to Grant Place M. E. church. Dr. Truesdall had been appointed to a church on the south [77] side. I want to say a word about Dr. Truesdall. He was pastor of a church down in Hyde Park that was entirely consumed. He went to take charge of matters and the book accounts in the Relief Association, and he showed such aptitude and quickness, and decision of character that he was elected secretary of the Chicago Aid & Relief Association. He has handled millions and millions of money that came to the association from all parts of the world after the great fire. If any money has been retained by him, it is unknown to the scrutinizing eyes of the managers of the Relief Association, and it is fair to say that not a cent of money ever adhered to his fingers that did not belong to him. He is just closing a term of six years on the Chicago district as presiding elder. He is now president of the Board of Public Charities of the state of Illinois. He has been nominated and appointed as corresponding secretary of the Preachers’ Relief Association of the M. E. church; but he did not take charge of that at the last annual conference, but was appointed general superintendent after all these years of the Chicago Aid and Relief Association; this shows that the board of management maintains its confidence in his integrity and ability. He has been my friend, the friend of my family; he attended the funeral of my daughter and my wife, and my son-in-law, Mr. J. A. Jones. In all these years, in all these relations he has sustained an untarnished and reputable name for [78] honesty, integrity and ability, both as a preacher and a business man. At the annual conference of 1871, I was re-elected to Grant Place M. E. church. I resigned my position because of the stress of matters in the Chicago Home for the Friendless, but was re-elected corresponding secretary with the understanding that I was to do but very little work, and received for compensation, for my name and little influence, fifty dollars a month. I took charge of the Grant Place M. E. church on no salary. They did not know whether they could pay me a cent or a very little, and I accepted the situation and had no situation for all that conference year. My family and I were well supported by voluntary contributions of the people and the fifty dollars I received from the Home for the Friendless. I wish to speak further of the Chicago Home for the Friendless. I was connected with it as corresponding secretary, that is financial and executive officer, for about seven years altogether. It was an undenominational institution, all kinds of people, some that were Christians and some that were not were members of its board of management. It was largely under the influence of women. As I have said before, Jonathan Burr was the president of it; he was deeply interested in it and gave a great deal of thought and money to its management. He was a bachelor, wealthy, generous, a [79] liberal man, and advised liberal things for the maintainance and support of the poor. He had largely to do with its formation and management. When I first became connected with the institution, he was a nervous, broken-down man and did not act as president of the institution, only nominally. William Blair, an iron merchant, was vice-president and was the active officer. It was through his solicitation and influence that I became connected with the institution. Mr. Blair waited upon me and solicited me in the name of the board of managers to become the financial manager and executive officer of the board. Mr. Blair was a Presbyterian, a clean, nice, straight, honorable, high-minded, generous Christian man. Mr. Burr greatly desired what is known as industrial schools, where the children of the poor would be taught some industry, the girls to keep clean and take care of the home, and while he did not advise any special branch for the education of the boys outside of the Home for the Friendless, yet he greatly desired that all should learn how to support themselves. He established industrial schools to this end, supported largely by his money, but under the management of the board of the Home of the Friendless. These industrial schools had a teacher—there were two of them—and had also a sort of chapel, where sunday [sic] school and services were held, but strictly undenominational. Mr. Blair gave very liberally of his money for the support of the Home and these industrial schools attached. [80] It was not long until Mr. Blair went to Europe and his vacancy as vice-president was filled by F. D. Gray, who was a wholesale groceryman at the time, an honorable, straight, exact man,--severe in condemning himself as the worst of men,, always acting as the best of men. He was an exceedingly exact man in his business transactions as well as Mr. Blair. The vice-president signed all the drafts for money to be drawn, and I counter-signed them, and thus I had a chance to know both Mr. Blair and Mr. Gray and their mode of doing business. As I have stated, I resigned that position in 1869, and went back to the pastorate for a year to Grant Place M. E. church. During that year Mr. Burr died, and it became known that he had left large bequests, chiefly of real estate on Randolph street, for the support of those institutions. As the business was largely increased, Mr. Mosley had left a ten thousand dollar bequest, and others until there was a large money interest with rentals to look after. I was written to by Mr. Gray to concent [sic] to retake the position I held before, when I resigned and went into the pastorate. The board had so instructed him; I looked the matter over and thought there was a reason why I should return to the institution, hence I resigned the pastorate of the church and became again the corresponding secretary of the Home for the Friendless. The charter of the institution was made out really in the name of twelve men, who were called the managers at large, and [81] who could contract, sue and be sued and do all other business that was necessary to be done for the institution. There were female managers from different churches, and some that were not members of any church. The Unitarians, and Universalists especially were deeply interested in the institution as Mr. Burr was a Unitarian, and that lead them to become deeply interested as well. There was a board of management, consisting of some sixty or seventy women; prominent among them were such women as Mrs. Jane Hoge, Mrs. Mary Livermore, whom I think I have mentioned before, Mrs. F. D. Gray, Mrs. Charles Wheeler and a great many others. Mrs. Hoge had as much to do with the government of the institution as any other woman, and perhaps a little more. She was a remarkable woman, a woman of great breadth of mind, education, had great executive ability, and extraordinary talents to communicate by word or writing her thoughts. She and Mrs. Mary A. Livermore are well-known throughout the United States now. Mrs. Livermore and Mrs. Hoge were also at that time the head of what was known as the Sanitary Commission for the benefit of soldiers. It started extensively during the war that was raging at the time and did a vast work. I never knew a better woman than Mrs. F. P. Gray, the wife of the vice-president of the Home. She is still identified with the institution. Mr. Hoge is dead, and Mrs. Livermore lives in Boston and is a public lecturer throughout the United States. [82] I never knew a better and purer woman than Mrs. F. P. Gray. She was also one of the chief ones in shaping and directing affairs, and was for many years the recording secretary of the institution. Thee were many other women worth mentioning that ought to be named, but I have not the space or time to do it now. As I have stated, the endowments that the institution had lately received made it necessary that a corresponding secretary be secured. I did not want to return to the institution after I had resigned. I loved the pastorate and I was deeply interested in that work, but it was urged that I should come back as I could do better work there than anyone else. And too, our home was altogether; I desired to remain in the city, so I returned to be the managing agent or financial secretary. The object, as I have stated before, was to provide temporary homes for women and children, those that had no homes to shelter, feed and protect them. Adults were kept only for a little while, but sent away to support themselves. The children were indentured by the consent or [sic] their parents into what we thought were good families. The design was not to keep children in the institution, but to send them out where they could be a part and parcel of the family and be brought up in families. I conceived the object to be eminently worthy and whereby great work could be done for the Master. The reason Mr. F. P. Gray assigned for my returning was that there was large property [83] and from his five years’ acquaintance he knew I would not steal; he wanted some one to manage that property in whom he had confidence. I traveled for the institution largely throughout this state and Wisconsin, and also in Michigan, soliciting funds and procuring homes for these children. A great deal of money was given in the city and a great deal of produce and clothing, and an interest was awakened in the country and that was my business as well as indenturing the children out. I not only solicited funds but helped to look after the institution. When I became connected with it, a Mrs. Wights was matron or superintendent. She had a husband and he lived in the Home and did a great deal of her work. She did not meet the approbation in many respects of the board of management, and hence they sought to have another matron, as it was called then. Mrs. Hoge and Mrs. Livermore became acquainted during the war in the hospitals with Mrs. Grant. She had been connected with some hospital work among the soldiers, and showed herself to be a woman of fine executive ability, and hence they solicited her to become the matron of the Home, which she did. I was identified with her in the management more largely than anybody else for some four, five or six years. I never knew a better woman for the place—eminently fitted for the work. She was large hearted, generous, kind, devoted Christian woman. Her husband was a Congregational minister; her son John is now principal of that Harvard branch for preparing young men for Harvard [84] College, situated in Chicago. A Miss Bowman had been connected with one of the institutions of Indiana in Indianapolis, became identified with the management at the same time Mrs. Grant did. Miss Bowman is now the superintendent of the Newsboys’ Home in Chicago. I found that she was in every sense of the word, capable, and did as much for the management as any other person connected with it. There was a Miss Hovey who came with her from the hospitals of the south, and who remained and died there in the Home. Miss Bowman became editor of the Home Visitor. She was an educated woman. There were many men that were deeply interested in the institution; such men as Henry W. King, Ward Dexter, and others. Mr. T. M. Avery, whose wife was one of the twelve managers, was a great friend of the institution. I got references from anybody and everybody to persons of means who would be likely to give support for the institution. Mr. Henry W. King did a great deal in that way and also Mr. T. M. Avery. Mr. Avery recommended me to a Mr. Taylor then connected with agricultural interests. I went to see Mr. Taylor, who asked me for papers and documents. I gave him the charter and also the papers. He asked me for references and I referred him to Mr. T. M. Avery. He said I could not refer him to any better person. I went again and he gave me a hundred dollars. He did that every year while I was with the board. Mr. [85] Taylor at his death left a large bequest to the Home for the Friendless, the largest that anyone gave at any one time. Thus it was that he became interested in the institution; Mr. Avery should also have a large amount of credit. Others became interested and to-day parties are contributing to it of their means and their will for the benefit of that benevolent institution. We put up an addition to the Home during my connection with it; it was situated on Wabash Avenue and 21st street in a prominent part of the city. I continued to act prominently up to the time of the fire and at the fire everything was burned up, the people did not know where they were financially, and I tendered my resignation so as to lighten the expense; the board refused to accept it, gave me a nominal salary and I returned to the pastorate at Grant Place church on no salary. They did not know whether they could pay anything or not, but I lived within the bounds of the church and consented to serve them. I have stated I was connected with it two years, one year intervening. During that year I was deeply interested in the pastoral work. In 1874, the managers o