Memoirs of General William T. Sherman — Complete
not" "Have you ever had a vote of thanks by name?" "No!" "Well,
these are the only privileged members." I then told him he knew
well enough who I was, and that if he chose he could take me in.
He then said, "Have you any impudence?" I told him, "A reasonable
amount if occasion called for it." "Do you think you could become
so interested in my conversation as not to notice the door-keeper?"
(pointing to him). I told him that there was not the least doubt
of it, if he would tell me one of his funny stories. He then took
my arm, and led me a turn in the vestibule, talking about some
indifferent matter, but all the time directing my looks to his left
hand, toward which he was gesticulating with his right; and thus we
approached the door-keeper, who began asking me, "Foreign
ambassador? Governor of a State? Member of Congress?" etc.; but I
caught Corwin's eye, which said plainly, "Don't mind him, pay
attention to me," and in this way we entered the Senate-chamber by
a side-door. Once in, Corwin said, "Now you can take care of
yourself," and I thanked him cordially.
I found a seat close behind Mr. Webster, and near General Scott,
and heard the whole of the speech. It was heavy in the extreme,
and I confess that I was disappointed and tired long before it was
finished. No doubt the speech was full of fact and argument, but
it had none of the fire of oratory, or intensity of feeling, that
marked all of Mr. Clay's efforts.
Toward the end of July, as before stated, all the family went home
to Lancaster. Congress was still in session, and the bill adding
four captains to the Commissary Department had not passed, but was
reasonably certain to, and I was equally sure of being one of them.
At that time my name was on the muster-roll of (Light) Company C,
Third Artillery (Bragg's), stationed at Jefferson Barracks, near
St. Louis. But, as there was cholera at St. Louis, on application,
I was permitted to delay joining my company until September. Early
in that month, I proceeded to Cincinnati, and thence by steamboat
to St. Louis, and then to Jefferson Barracks, where I reported
for duty to Captain and Brevet-Colonel Braxton Bragg, commanding
(Light) Company C, Third Artillery. The other officers of the
company were First-Lieutenant James A. Hardie, and afterward
Haekaliah Brown. New horses had just been purchased for the
battery, and we were preparing for work, when the mail brought the
orders announcing the passage of the bill increasing the Commissary
Department by four captains, to which were promoted Captains
Shiras, Blair, Sherman, and Bowen. I was ordered to take post at
St. Louis, and to relieve Captain A. J. Smith, First Dragoons, who
had been acting in that capacity for some months. My commission
bore date September 27,1850. I proceeded forthwith to the city,
relieved Captain Smith, and entered on the discharge of the duties
of the office.
Colonel N. S. Clarke, Sixth Infantry, commanded the department;
Major D. C. Buell was adjutant-general, and Captain W. S. Hancock
was regimental quartermaster; Colonel Thomas Swords was the depot
quartermaster, and we had our offices in the same building, on the
corner of Washington Avenue and Second. Subsequently Major S. Van
Vliet relieved Colonel Swords. I remained at the Planters' House
until my family arrived, when we occupied a house on Chouteau
Avenue, near Twelfth.
During the spring and summer of 1851, Mr. Ewing and Mr. Henry
Stoddard, of Dayton, Ohio, a cousin of my father, were much in St.
Louis, on business connected with the estate of Major Amos
Stoddard, who was of the old army, as early as the beginning of
this century. He was stationed at the village of St. Louis at the
time of the Louisiana purchase, and when Lewis and Clarke made
their famous expedition across the continent to the Columbia River.
Major Stoddard at that early day had purchased a small farm back of
the village, of some Spaniard or Frenchman, but, as he was a
bachelor, and was killed at Fort Meigs, Ohio, during the War of
1812, the title was for many years lost sight of, and the farm was
covered over by other claims and by occupants. As St. Louis began
to grow, his brothers and sisters, and their descendants, concluded
to look up the property. After much and fruitless litigation, they
at last retained Mr. Stoddard, of Dayton, who in turn employed Mr.
Ewing, and these, after many years of labor, established the title,
and in the summer of 1851 they were put in possession by the United
States marshal. The ground was laid off, the city survey extended
over it, and the whole was sold in partition. I made some
purchases, and acquired an interest, which I have retained more or
less ever since.
We continued to reside in St. Louis throughout the year 1851, and
in the spring of 1852 I had occasion to visit Fort Leavenworth on
duty, partly to inspect a lot of cattle which a Mr. Gordon, of Cass
County, had contracted to deliver in New Mexico, to enable Colonel
Sumner to attempt his scheme of making the soldiers in New Mexico
self-supporting, by raising their own meat, and in a measure their
own vegetables. I found Fort Leavenworth then, as now, a most
beautiful spot, but in the midst of a wild Indian country. There
were no whites settled in what is now the State of Kansas. Weston,
in Missouri, was the great town, and speculation in town-lots there
and thereabout burnt the fingers of some of the army-officers, who
wanted to plant their scanty dollars in a fruitful soil. I rode on
horseback over to Gordon's farm, saw the cattle, concluded the
bargain, and returned by way of Independence, Missouri. At
Independence I found F. X. Aubrey, a noted man of that day, who had
just made a celebrated ride of six hundred miles in six days. That
spring the United States quartermaster, Major L. C. Easton, at Fort
Union, New Mexico, had occasion to send some message east by a
certain date, and contracted with Aubrey to carry it to the nearest
post-office (then Independence, Missouri), making his compensation
conditional on the time consumed. He was supplied with a good
horse, and an order on the outgoing trains for an exchange. Though
the whole route was infested with hostile Indians, and not a house
on it, Aubrey started alone with his rifle. He was fortunate in
meeting several outward-bound trains, and there, by made frequent
changes of horses, some four or five, and reached Independence in
six days, having hardly rested or slept the whole way. Of course,
he was extremely fatigued, and said there was an opinion among the
wild Indians that if a man "sleeps out his sleep," after such
extreme exhaustion, he will never awake; and, accordingly, he
instructed his landlord to wake him up after eight hours of sleep.
When aroused at last, he saw by the clock that he had been asleep
twenty hours, and he was dreadfully angry, threatened to murder his
landlord, who protested he had tried in every way to get him up,
but found it impossible, and had let him "sleep it out" Aubrey, in
describing his sensations to me, said he took it for granted he was
a dead man; but in fact he sustained no ill effects, and was off
again in a few days. I met him afterward often in California, and
always esteemed him one of the best samples of that bold race of
men who had grown up on the Plains, along with the Indians, in the
service of the fur companies. He was afterward, in 1856, killed by
R. C. Weightman, in a bar-room row, at Santa Fe, New Mexico, where
he had just arrived from California.
In going from Independence to Fort Leavenworth, I had to swim Milk
Creek, and sleep all night in a Shawnee camp. The next day I
crossed the Kaw or Kansas River in a ferry boat, maintained by the
blacksmith of the tribe, and reached the fort in the evening. At
that day the whole region was unsettled, where now exist many rich
counties, highly cultivated, embracing several cities of from ten
to forty thousand inhabitants. From Fort Leavenworth I returned by
steamboat to St. Louis.
In the summer of 1852, my family went to Lancaster, Ohio; but I
remained at my post. Late in the season, it was rumored that I was
to be transferred to New Orleans, and in due time I learned the
cause. During a part of the Mexican War, Major Seawell, of the
Seventh Infantry, had been acting commissary of subsistence at New
Orleans, then the great depot of supplies for the troops in Texas,
and of those operating beyond the Rio Grande. Commissaries at that
time were allowed to purchase in open market, and were not
restricted to advertising and awarding contracts to the lowest
bidders. It was reported that Major Seawell had purchased largely
of the house of Perry Seawell & Co., Mr. Seawell being a relative
of his. When he was relieved in his duties by Major Waggman, of
the regular Commissary Department, the latter found Perry Seawell &
Co. so prompt and satisfactory that he continued the patronage;
for which there was a good reason, because stores for the use of
the troops at remote posts had to be packed in a particular way, to
bear transportation in wagons, or even on pack-mules; and this firm
had made extraordinary preparations for this exclusive purpose.
Some time about 1849, a brother of Major Waggaman, who had been
clerk to Captain Casey, commissary of subsistence, at Tampa Bay,
Florida, was thrown out of office by the death of the captain, and
he naturally applied to his brother in New Orleans for employment;
and he, in turn, referred him to his friends, Messrs. Perry
Seawell & Co. These first employed him as a clerk, and afterward
admitted him as a partner. Thus it resulted, in fact, that Major
Waggaman was dealing largely, if not exclusively, with a firm of
which his brother was a partner.
One day, as General Twiggs was coming across Lake Pontchartrain, he
fell in with one of his old cronies, who was an extensive grocer.
This gentleman gradually led the conversation to the downward
tendency of the times since he and Twiggs were young, saying that,
in former years, all the merchants of New Orleans had a chance at
government patronage; but now, in order to sell to the army
commissary, one had to take a brother in as a partner. General
Twiggs resented this, but the merchant again affirmed it, and gave
names. As soon as General Twiggs reached his office, he instructed
his adjutant-general, Colonel Bliss--who told me this--to address a
categorical note of inquiry to Major Waggaman. The major very
frankly stated the facts as they had arisen, and insisted that the
firm of Perry Seawell & Co. had enjoyed a large patronage, but
deserved it richly by reason of their promptness, fairness, and
fidelity. The correspondence was sent to Washington, and the
result was, that Major Waggaman was ordered to St. Louis, and I was
ordered to New Orleans.
I went down to New Orleans in a steamboat in the month of
September, 1852, taking with me a clerk, and, on arrival, assumed
the office, in a bank-building facing Lafayette Square, in which
were the offices of all the army departments. General D. Twiggs
was in command of the department, with Colonel W. W. S. Bliss
(son-in-law of General Taylor) as his adjutant-general. Colonel A.
C. Myers was quartermaster, Captain John F. Reynolds aide-de-camp,
and Colonel A. J. Coffee paymaster. I took rooms at the St. Louis
Hotel, kept by a most excellent gentleman, Colonel Mudge.
Mr. Perry Seawell came to me in person, soliciting a continuance of
the custom which he had theretofore enjoyed; but I told him frankly
that a change was necessary, and I never saw or heard of him
afterward. I simply purchased in open market, arranged for the
proper packing of the stores, and had not the least difficulty in
supplying the troops and satisfying the head of the department in