Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, October 10, 1922, Page Page Three, Image 3
GOVERNOR PERRY
Served South Carolina as Chief Exec.
utive fellowioy ippsaaHox.
OPPOSED THE WAR OF SECESSION
r' ~
Fought a Duel and Killed a Man Believed
to Have Been Set Upon Him
By Political Enemies?Beautiful
Letters to His Family On Record.
Benjamin F. Perry was one of the
great men of this state. He could not
be called brilliant, but his sound Judgment,
safe conclusions, reason from
facts, not carried away by zeal or enthusiasm,
put him ahead of his contemporaries
with the exception of Pctigru
O'Keall. J. S. Richardson, Alfred
Huger and one or two others.
From a sketch of his life written by
Mr. A. B- Williams come years ago,
editor of the Greenville News, these
facts are mostly gathered.
Born November 20, 1806, in what
was then known as Old Pendleton
district, row Oconee county, his father
was a native of Massachusetts, hi3
mother, Mies Foster of Virginia, was
connected by blood with Commodore
Oliver Perry. His father moved to
Charleston in 1784. Afterwards to
Greenville, S. C., whore he married
Miss Foster. Then he moved to Oconee
county, went to farming:, where
young Perry was born, was sent to
school at Asheville, N. C.; at an early
age he advocated the election of John
C. Calhoun, who was then opposed t^
state rights; went to Greenville in
1824 and studied lu,v under Judge
Karle; at the age of 19 years he was
chosen orator at a celebration of the
4th of July in Greenville. In 1827 was
admitted to the bar atd in 183? began
his long and protracted ngm *wr vutprcscrvation
of the Union against |
great odds. Spartanburg and Greenville
counties were .strong for that
lime, and Perry who was then editor
of the Greenville Mountaineer, led the
opposition to nullification and secession
dnd his paper was regarded as the
leading organ in the up-country. His J
political attitude made him many enev
mies, but he consistently kept up the
fight until his death, although when
the state seceded he did all he could
to aid the cause of the Confederacy.
There was much bitterness between
tl-e two parties, espec ally in the upcountry,
and Governor Perry was challenged
by. Bynum to fight a duel. Bynum
was killed, and I have heard was
burled in the churchyard of the Old
Stone church in Pendleton. It was a
cold day wnen me tiuei wus iuu^m
somewhere on the banks of the Sc.vnnni.h
river. Perry wore an overcoat
I'r.ed with red flannel. Looking down
ahd seeing $ piece of flannel, he
thought he was mortally wcunded. It
*yas rumored at the time that Bynum,
who was considered a dead sure shot,
was brought to Greenville by Perry's
many enemies for the purpose of getting
rid of hipi. Governor Terry regarded
this as one of the unfortunate
events of his life and never afterwards
alluded to it, although in the legislature
he strongly opposed any act to
abolish duels.
In 18"24, he ran for ingress against
Warren R. Davis, and was defeated
by only 700 votes out of a total of ever
7,000. In 1836, elected a member of the
legislature without opposition. He
strongly advocated prison reform and
with the cooperation of Prof. Leiber of
ti c S. C. college, worked for the estab
lishment of a penitentiary. He was
moat bitterly opposed to the parish
system, a great injustice to the upcountry.
He advocated the election of
governor and electors by a vote of the
people; was defeated in the legislature,
but was sustained by the people of
his county. In 1S44 was elected to the
state senate and was the sole member
v/ho voted against the expulsion of
Mr. Hoar from the state, a vote for
which he was greatl> commended by
the Union people and was proud of
until the day of his death. Governor
Perry boldly proclaimed his opposition
to secession and disunion. He was
very aggressive in his editorials and
addresses and some of his personal
friends advised him that if he continued
neither his life nor his property
would be safe. He always considered
his crowning glory was the position
that he took at this great crisis. No
one living outside of the state tun appreciate
the excitement of the people
at this dangerous crisis.
Governor Perry's courage, patriotism,
wisdom and high courtesy won
for him the respect and admiration
jeven of his opponents.
He was again elected to the legislature
and he and his two colleagues
from Greenville county were the only
Union men in that body. Was a member
of the state convention in 1S51,
and as a member of the committee of
21 appointed to prepare a report, lie
submitted an able minority report, dissenting
from the resolution prepared
and presented by Judge Cheves, which
de.'cnded the right of secession. In
1S'>U. \v:is a memDcr 01 ine v.nariesu>n
convention of the Democratic body.
Tile galleries hissed h;m every time he
arose to vote and when he arose to
speak, it became so loud and continuous
that he could with difficulty proceed.
"Let them remain, Mr. Chairman."
he said in deep tones and deliberate
manner. "I would like them
to hear what I have to say." His
speech was not without effect, but as
one of the results ol the convention,
the parties split. Tw< candidates were
nominated by the T -mocratic party,
which led to the dec.ion of Abraham
Lincoln. In 1860, an election was ordered
for a convention to declare the
Union dissolved.
Governor Perry, in his paper, fought
this to the bitter end. He predicted
the war and defeat of the South and
urged tViat it was foliy to secede with
NEW PICTURE OF
This is the latest photograph i
taken from an automobile which
former President was taking his
Washington.
the great preponderance of wealth ami
population in the North, with their
enormous resources and command of ,
the sea. The convention was against
him, however, but he went down wun j
flying colors. Tho candidates from (
Greenville county to tho convention'
were all defeated.
His friends and staunch supporters
were Jas. 1'. Boyce and Chief Justice
O'Neall. For the first time in thirty j
years he was defeated in his own l
county. Being too old for active service,
he supported the Confederacy
with voice and purse. Served as a j
member of the legislature, Confederate |
commissioner, district attorney and j
district judge. After Appomattox, he
was chosen by President Johnson pro- j
visional governor of this state. Under
his administration the legislature carried
out much of the work he had supported
for years. Abolished the parish
system, and the light to elect governor
and presidential electors was
given to .the people. The penitentiary
was established, the courts of law and
equity were combined and the state
banking: system was abolished. After
the expiration of his (service as governor,
he returned to Greenville and
was elected United States cenalor, but
like other Southern senators was de- j
nied a scat. His last prominent service
was in 1S76, when at the ag of
71, he went as one of the South Carolina
delegates to the St. Louis conven- i
tion, by which Tilden and Hendricks
were nominated.
His law practiee was large and lucrative.
Always dignified and courteous,
he observed the highest standards
of professional ethics.
He married in 1837, in the city of
Charleston, Miss Elizabeth F. MeCall,
daughter of Hext MeCall. and a niece
of liobert Y. llnyne.
He carefully kept a diary all his life
and it is much to he regretted that it j
has never been published, lie was not
a member of any church, but attended I
Christ Episcopal church in (Jreenviile,
with his fumily.
J'ne inner ran ui n;s isi> \\a.-, ci>i-m ,
in seclusion at his country home near
Greenville, "where ho had one of the
best libraries in the state.
Gover?.or Perry was one of the finest j
looking men I ever saw. According to j
his own statement he was six feet two I
and a half inches tall, without an
ounce of suporflous flosii. He greatly |
resembled the English statesman Dis- I
NEW JUSTICE OF THE UNITE
Justice George H. Sutherland
I Justice Clarke of Ohio.
EX-PRESIDENT.
I
sanr^
if ex-President Woodrow Wilson,
encountered that in which the
afternoon ride in the streets of
MERCHANTS KICK.
Claim They Are Paying More Than
Their Share of Taxes.
Resolutions protesting: against the
present taxation of mercantile stocks,
and calling on the South Carolina tax
commission to afford some relief, were
adopted at a meeting1 held In Greenwood
lust week of merchants from
Greenwood and other towns cf the Piedmont
section. The resolutions requested
ail retail merchants throughout
South Carolina to unite in the effort
to procure relief. The merchants
claim that they are unfairly taxed on
their inventories and accounts instead
of on the capital invested. The tax
system and the laws were explained
by F. 11. Grier, Greenwood attorney,
who had been invited to address the
meeting. Mr. Grier went over the
present tax system with the merchants
and explained all legal phases.
.J. \V. Kirkpatrick of Belk-Kirkpatrick
in Greenville, declared that his
taxes were 14 per cent of the capital
invested and numerous other similar
examples were cited. Merchants
asserted that the present system of
taxing mercantile stocks was ruinous
to them, and for three years mercantile
stocks have been (axed at a higher
rate than any other class of prop
erty in, me siaie. 1 ne resolutions passed
.state that the tax commission has
been asked to equalize and assess this
class of property on the same basis as
other property is assessed, but has
failed to do so. The resolutions urge
all merchants to gather and tabulate
facts and figures on the true value of
mercantile property for the guidance
of the commission, and urge merchants
to take lip the matter of equalization
with the legislature at iis next session,
if nothing is done by the tax commission.
? Two prisoners escaped from the
Florence county jail Friday night by
sawing through the bars.
laeli, although to my mind he was a
much finer looking man.
lie wrote a series of letters to his
wife, both before and after marriage,
which exhibit In tiie highest degree
the love and affection he had for his
family, and his great concern about j
Iheir welfare. There is also much j
which throws light upon the manner I
of living at that time.
D STATES SUPREME COURT.
ok Utah has taken the place of
YANKEE DOODLE HOUSE
_
Historic Dwelling in Albany is Falling:
With Decay.
Father and I went down to camp
Along with Cap'n Cioodin';
And there we saw the man and boys
As thick as hasty puddin'.
So wrote Surgeon Dick Schuckburg |
of His Majesty's Colonial Army in 1755, j
composing what was intended as a |
satirical ballad aimed at the American
Yankee, but which later became our,
first National anthem and was sung by
the Yankees when Cornwallis surrendered
Yorktown in 1781.
The stalwart Dick sat perched on
the curb of a wejl in the rear of the
old Van Rensselaer mansion, which
overlooks the Hudson river at Albany.
Round about could be seen the British
officers of the general's staff, spick and I
span in the brilliant uniform of His
Majesty's forces. The old mansion, j
the home of Col. Johannes Van Rens- j
selaer, had become the headquarters
of Gen. Amherst, commander of the |
King's Colonial forces. In those days
the mansion was a magnificent old
place and then, as now, said to have |
been the oldest house in America, it
having boon erected in 1642.' Round
about were encamped the great force
of British regulars and Colonials,.
happy and unsuspecting the final defeat
that was to befall them several
yeai-s later at Ticonderoga, where they j
were to clash with the forces of the :
Frcncli under Montcalm.
As the regulars watched the Colonial i
soldiers the irrepressible Dick Schr.ck- !
burg of His Majesty's Colonial regulars,
a gay blade with a keen mind, I
whose bubbling wit and satirical sallies i
made him a welcome addition at any
gathering! took occasion to write a |
merry quip on the ragged, unsoldlerly ,
appearing Colonial troops whose,
frontier garb and rough and ready;
ways made them tne subjects of much j
merriment.
Thus from the pen of the rolllcksome
Dick Schuckburg was "Yankee Doodle" I
born, a satire on the frontier soldiermen,
but borrowed, it must be confessed,
from an old song said to have
been based on Cromwell's entry into;
Oxford.
The song swept the king's army like
wildfire. Although dashed off as Dick
sat on the edge of an old well, no j
doubt to the accompaniment of the!
laughter of Dick's army friends as ho
recited his verses, it was filled with
the dash that made the Colonials the
best sort of fighting men and with not
a little of their quaint manner of expression.
And the Yankee soldiers
accepted it as their own, ana laier,
during the war of the Revolution, flung
rFASTEiTiFORTY ~ DAY S,
| ^ \ j
: i '
I . -'V
h .si
; . J&<?8
I L * j -. -. .
Mme. Melania Lipinska, noted
blind physician, has gone forty
days without -iood and thirty days
without water. She advises fasting
as a cure for many ills,
it back at tlfeir enemies. They look
the words that had been sung in derision
to challenge the British arms.
British soldiers resenting this mockery
in 1769, sung in Boston harbor:
"Yankee Doodle came to town
For to buy a firelock?
We will tar and feather him,
And so we will, John Hancock."
The old mansion where Yankee
Doodle was written was built by the '
order of Killean Van Rensselaer, who j
sent his first ship to the new colony ,
Ii?? 1C 1 fiSil The inserintion on the!
cellar wall of the old brick building:
reads: "K. V. R., 1?42 Anno Domini." j
One hundred years later there was
added a dinning room, larger hall and ;
the small building of Col. Johannes
Van Rensselaer.
The inscription on a brass plate on |
i If'vil /^cate\
the side of the historic old mansion '
reads as follows:
Supposed to be the
OLDEST BUILDING IN THE
UNITED STATES
and to Have Been Erected in 1C42
as a Manor House and Place of Defense
Known as FORT CRALO,
Gen'l Abercrombie's Headquarters
While Marching to Attack Fort
Ticonderoga in 1758. Tiiere It is Said i
That at the Cantonment East of This ;
House,
Near the Old Well, the Army Surgeon, j
R. Shuckburg, Composed the Popular i
Song of "Yankee Doodle."
Today the ancient building is owned
by Mrs. Van Rensselaer Strong of
Phllud. iphia, a member of the famous
old Van Rensselaer family. She has
offered to give it to the state of New
York for museum purposes, but they
do not move very fast, according to
Joljn W. I'encueton, 01 a?, biz tuniun,
Avenue, Albany, who takes care of the j
birthplace of America's first national
anthem.
At present this massive old brick
structure with its hugo rough-hewn
beams of oak and low, dark-studded
walls is being used to manufacture
concrete building blocks, The wonderful
old place with its grea. fireplace
and its creaking stairs is fa.st falling
into decay. Heaps of crumbling
plaster fail from the walls. The building
is damp and mouldering. The roof
is in poor condition and rain creeps
into tlje old mansion.
HAD BIBLES AND BOOZE
Greenville County Preacher Arrested
as He Leaves Revival Meeting.
What some members of the Green
ville police force termed a " nixing oe
the word of Cod and the spirit of the
Devil" was brought to light Sunday
night in the mountains that skirt the
upper edge of the county, relates the
Creenvilio Piedmont of Thursday.
The revealing of this odd 'mixture"
came abopt rear Cross Plains church
and was due to the accidental meeting
of Rev. \V. P. Step, n Baptist
ppeacher, with State Constable J. H.
Howard and another officer. Rev.
Step was rn his way home after having
preached at a service of a revival
meeting which he was conducting at
Durham's School house. The officers
were out after a "still." When they
met the Rev. Step in the road, however,
they turned aside from the quest
for the "moonshine factory" long
enough to investigate the paper hand- I
1 - ? ? KlnU naannkon nnrvlofl An
uu?? which ihv7 j/i culiivi vt*4 i ?vv>.
inspection of the contents of the hap:
revealed two Bibles and a quart of
"moonshine" whisky in a fruit jar.
Constable Howard was in Greenville
tcday and told the police he would
swear out a warrant against the
preacher charging violation of the
prohibition law.
(t was said at police headquarters
today that Rev. Step would be given
a preliminary hearing before the
United States commissioner here tomorrow.
In one of the Bibles which the
minister carried in his paper bag
there was found at police headquarters
today a circular letter sent out by a |
committee of the state organization
of the Anti-Saloon League at Columbia
to ministers urging them to exert
their efforts and influence toward prohibition
enforcement. In the same
Bible there was also found a sheet of
paper on which sermon notes had been
written.
Rev. Step is the pastor of the Pleasant
Grove Baptist church in the upper
section of the county and is well
known in the section in which he lives.
PRPP4RF TO FIGHT
Michigan Women to Oppose Return of
Long Skirts.
A fight by women for the right to
wear skirts at the length they see fit
is on in Flint, Michigan. Ten young
women, holding that they do not have
to abide by the edicts of Dame Fashion,
employers and others in dictating
whai girls should or should not wear,
have formed the "So Longer Skirt
Club."
The chief purpose of the club is for
the survival of the short skirt. The
club plans launching a vigorous campaign
in which members hope to enlist
the aid of every woman in Flint.
The following officers have been
elected: Mrs. Eva Peck, president;
Miss Lulu Vernor, secretary, and Miss
Helen Wheeler, treasurer.
? Hayward Nettles, a young man of j
Florence, accidentally shot and killed
himself while on a hunting and fishing
trip on Black river near Kingstree
last Friday. The young man was in j
the act of putting several guns into j
an automobile when lie touched the j
trigger of one of them anil the charge j
entered his body.
Nl\A milGXTsUlj fe
f' k"4rV?.
1 fflff W 1 MAMM
li! \ ,V) SUPE
INCOMPflR
? 1 - - - *
| Get Ready HOW!
I WITHIN'THE NEXT THIRTY DAYS you
t " i
$ will have urgent need for your Heating Stoves. 2
X The cool nights and cool mornings have al- ?
| ready given you warning. <
$ How is your heating apparatus? Are your \ \
& coal and wood heaters in good shape? Is the old
stove piping that did service last winter in ser- %
i vie cable condition for the coming cool weather ?
| Are your stoves in good shape or have they
I about run their course?
Look 'em over and then see us for what you are ;;
| going to need for heating this winter.
I Possibly you will want ail air-tight coal heater %
| or an air-tight wood burner. X
I Whichever you may want we have it and can
I put it in for you on short notice. jjt'
I If you need new piping or (ithcr heating lix- X
I lures let us serve you. %
| YORK FURNITURE COMPANY \
V* ' T 1 ' ' " - * '
i i.- A O r *./ u
n r* %ir
lo ssedure we
Have Them }
YES, to he sure, we believe that every man and
woman and boy and girl in these parts knows that
we have the best line of fine Dress Shoes to be had
in this section, we also want everybody who wears
Shoes to KNOW that we have an exceptionally big
stock of High-Grade Medium Priced Shoes?both
for Woi'k and for Dress wear. We have
Men's Work Shoes at $2.00 to $5.00 a Pair.
Men's and Women's Dress and Work Shoes at
$2.50 to $5.00 a Pair?All leathers and styles.
To be sure we have lots of popular priced shoes.
MEN'S SHIRTS?
This week we have received a tremendous line
of Men's Shirts?almost every conceivable style?
the most pleasing patterns. Ask to see the Shirts
with the new Reversible French Cuff, and the new
Soft Neck Bands. They are new and worth while.
Sure, we have Shirts without collars and also ^
with collars attached.
| MEN'S AND BOYS' UNDERWEAR?
A little warm yet, but we want you to know we
have what you want when you want it.
HOSIERY FOR EVERYBODY?
It is a tremendous line of Hosiery for Men, Women,
Gril ls and Boys that we received this weekhave
them in silk, lisle and cotton and also in wool.
All sizes, and in the wanted colors for all.
A full line of Holeproof Hosiery for Ladies, for
Men and for Children. Let us show you.
HATS FOR MEN
It's Fall Hat Time and St roup's is the Fall Hat
Store?Here's where you find the latest styles in
Stetson and Knox Hats in the newest styles and in
the staple blacks and pleasing fancy shades. See
St roup's for correct Fall hats.
MEN'S AND BOYS' CLOTHING?
Did you know that you can buy that Suit you
need now at a price that you can well afford to pay
and at the same time get really stylish, snappy,
quality Clothing?Clothing that you'll be proud
to wear. Keep it in mind that we will really save
you money on Clothing; but you won't go amiss to
make an early selection. Just try us.
J. M. STROUP
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RB POULTRY DISPLAY K7S
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