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Title: The Jefferson-Lemen Compact
The Relations of Thomas Jefferson and James Lemen in the
Exclusion of Slavery from Illinois and Northern Territory
with Related Documents 1781-1818
Author: Willard C. MacNaul
Release Date: April 29, 2007 [EBook #21251]
Language: English
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The Jefferson-Lemen Compact
The Relations of
Thomas Jefferson and James Lemen
in the Exclusion of Slavery from Illinois
and the Northwest Territory
with Related Documents
1781-1818
A Paper read before the
Chicago Historical Society
February 16, 1915
By
Willard C. MacNaul
[Illustration: Arms]
The University of Chicago Press
1915
Copyright by
CHICAGO HISTORICAL SOCIETY
1915
CONTENTS {p.03}
INTRODUCTION
1. Sketch of James Lemen.................................. 7
2. Lemen's Relations with Jefferson in Virginia........... 9
3. Lemen's Anti-Slavery Mission in Illinois--
Slavery in Illinois until 1787...................... 11
Prohibition of Slavery by Ordinance of 1787......... 11
The Slavery Conflict under Gov. St. Clair
(1787-1800)....................................... 12
The Slavery Conflict under Gov. Harrison
(1801-1809)....................................... 13
Slavery Question in the Movement for Division
of Indiana Territory in 1808-9.................... 16
James Lemen's Anti-Slavery Influence in the
Baptist Churches until 1809....................... 16
Slavery under Gov. Ninian Edwards (1809-1818)....... 19
Slavery in the Campaign for Statehood in 1818....... 19
4. Available Materials Relating to the Subject........... 23
5. Account of the "Lemen Family Notes"................... 24
DOCUMENTS
I. Diary of James Lemen, Sr.............................. 26
II. History of the Relations of James Lemen
and Thos. Jefferson, by J. M. Peck.................. 32
III. How Illinois Got Chicago, by Jos. B. Lemen............ 37
IV. Address to the Friends of Freedom..................... 38
V. Recollections of a Centennarian, by
Dr. W. F. Boyakin................................... 39
VI. In Memory of Rev. Jas. Lemen, Sr...................... 41
VII. Statement by Editor of _Belleville Advocate_.......... 41
VIII. Letter of Rev. J. M. Peck on the Old Lemen
Family Notes........................................ 42
PIONEER LETTERS {p.04}
IX. Letter of Senator Douglas to Rev. Jas. Lemen, Sr...... 46
X. Announcement by J. B. Lemen........................... 48
XL. Letter of Gov. Ninian Edwards to Jas. Lemen, Jr....... 49
XII. Letter of A. W. Snyder to Jas. Lemen, Sr.............. 49
XIII. Letter of Abraham Lincoln to Jas. Lemen, Jr........... 50
XIV. The Lemen Monument--Lemen's War Record................ 51
XV. Sketch of Rev. James Lemen, Sr., by J. M. Peck........ 52
XVI. Old Lemen Family Notes, Statement by Jos. B. Lemen.... 56
References............................................ 59
NOTE {p.05}
The materials here presented were collected in connection with the
preparation of a history of the first generation of Illinois Baptists.
The narrative introduction is printed substantially as delivered at a
special meeting of the Chicago Historical Society, and, with the
collection of documents, is published in response to inquiries
concerning the so-called "Lemen Family Notes," and in compliance with
the request for a contribution to the publications of this Society. It
is hoped that the publication may serve to elicit further information
concerning the alleged "Notes," the existence of which has become a
subject of more or less interest to historians. The compiler merely
presents the materials at their face value, without assuming to pass
critical judgment upon them.
W. C. M.
INTRODUCTION {p.07}
RELATIONS OF JAMES LEMEN AND THOMAS JEFFERSON IN THE EXCLUSION OF
SLAVERY FROM ILLINOIS AND THE NORTHWEST TERRITORY
In view of the approaching centennary of statehood in Illinois, the
name of James Lemen takes on a timely interest because of his
services--social, religious, and political--in the making of the
Commonwealth. He was a native of Virginia, born and reared in the
vicinity of Harper's Ferry. He served a two-years' enlistment in the
Revolutionary War under Washington, and afterwards returned to his
regiment during the siege of Yorktown. His "Yorktown Notes" in his
diary give some interesting glimpses of his participation in that
campaign.[1] His Scotch ancestors had served in a similar cause under
Cromwell, whose wedding gift to one of their number is still cherished
as a family heirloom.
Upon leaving the army James Lemen married Catherine Ogle, daughter of
Captain Joseph Ogle, whose name is perpetuated in that of Ogle county,
Illinois. The Ogles were of old English stock, some of whom at least
were found on the side of Cromwell and the Commonwealth. Catherine's
family at one time lived on the South Branch of the Potomac, although
at the time of her marriage her home was near Wheeling. Captain Ogle's
commission, signed by Gov. Patrick Henry, is now a valued possession
of one of Mrs. Lemen's descendants. James and Catherine Lemen were
well fitted by nature and training for braving the hardships and
brightening the privations of life on the frontier, far removed from
home and friends, or even the abodes of their nearest white kinsmen.
During, and even before the war, young Lemen is reputed to have been
the protégé of Thomas Jefferson, through whose influence he became a
civil and religious leader in the pioneer period of Illinois history.
Gov. Reynolds, in his writings relating to this period,[2] gives
various sketches of the man and his family, and his name occurs
frequently in {p.08} the records of the times. He was among the first
to follow Col. Clark's men to the Illinois country, where he
established the settlement of New Design, one of the earliest American
colonies in what was, previous to his arrival, the "Illinois county"
of the Old Dominion. Here he served, first as a justice of the peace,
and then as a judge of the court of the original county of St. Clair,
and thus acquired the title of "Judge Lemen."[3] Here, too, he became
the progenitor of the numerous Illinois branch of the Lemen family,
whose genealogy and family history was recently published by Messrs.
Frank and Joseph B. Lemen--a volume of some four hundred and fifty
pages, and embracing some five hundred members of the family.
True to his avowed purpose in coming to Illinois, young Lemen became a
leader of anti-slavery sentiment in the new Territory, and,
undoubtedly, deserves to be called one of the Fathers of the Free
State Constitution, which was framed in 1818 and preserved in 1824.
His homestead, the "Old Lemen Fort" at New Design, which is still the
comfortable home of the present owner, is the birthplace of the
Baptist denomination in Illinois; and he himself is commemorated as
the recognized founder of that faith in this State, by a granite shaft
in the family burial plot directly in front of the old home. This
memorial was dedicated in 1909 by Col. William Jennings Bryan, whose
father, Judge Bryan, of Salem, Illinois, was the first to suggest it
as a well-deserved honor.
James Lemen, Sr., also became the father and leader of the noted
"Lemen Family Preachers," consisting of himself and six stalwart sons,
all but one of whom were regularly ordained Baptist ministers. The
eldest son, Robert, although never ordained, was quite as active and
efficient in the cause as any of the family. This remarkable family
eventually became the nucleus of a group of anti-slavery Baptist
churches in Illinois which had a very important influence upon the
issue of that question in the State. Rev. James Lemen, Jr., who is
said to have been the second American boy born in the Illinois
country, succeeded to his father's position of leadership in the
anti-slavery movement of the times, and served as the representative
of St. Clair county in the Territorial Legislature, the Constitutional
Convention, and the State Senate. The younger James Lemen was on terms
of intimacy with Abraham Lincoln at Springfield, and {p.09} his
cousin, Ward Lamon, was Lincoln's early associate in the law, and also
his first biographer. Various representatives of the family in later
generations have attained success as farmers, physicians, teachers,
ministers, and lawyers throughout southern Illinois and other sections
of the country.[4]
The elder James Lemen was himself an interesting character, and,
entirely apart from his relations with Jefferson, he is a significant
factor in early Illinois history. His fight for free versus slave
labor in Illinois and the Northwest derives a peculiar interest,
however, from its association with the great name of Jefferson. The
principles for which the latter stood--but not necessarily his
policies--have a present-day interest for us greater than those of his
contemporaries, because those principles are the "live issues" of our
own times. Jefferson is to that extent our contemporary, and hence his
name lends a living interest to otherwise obscure persons and remote
events. The problem of free labor versus slave labor we have with us
still, and in a much more complex and widespread form than in
Jefferson's day.
According to the current tradition, a warm personal friendship sprang
up between Jefferson and young Lemen, who was seventeen years the
junior of his distinguished patron and friend. In a letter to Robert,
brother of James Lemen, attributed to Jefferson, he writes: "Among all
my friends who are near, he is still a little nearer. I discovered his
worth when he was but a child, and I freely confess that in some of my
most important achievements his example, wish, and advice, though then
but a very young man, largely influenced my action." In a sketch of
the relations of the two men by Dr. John M. Peck we are told that
"after Jefferson became President of the United States, he retained
all of his early affection for Mr. Lemen"; and upon the occasion of a
visit of a mutual friend to the President, in 1808, "he inquired after
him with all the fondness of a father."[5]
Their early relations in Virginia, so far as we have any account of
them, concerned their mutual anti-slavery interests. Peck tells us
that "Mr. Lemen was a born anti-slavery leader, and had proved himself
such in Virginia by inducing scores of masters to free their slaves
through his prevailing kindness of manner and Christian arguments."
Concerning {p.10} the cession of Virginia's claims to the Northwest
Territory, Jefferson is thus quoted, from his letter to Robert Lemen:
"Before any one had even mentioned the matter, James Lemen, by reason
of his devotion to anti-slavery principles, suggested to me that we
(Virginia) make the transfer, and that slavery be excluded; and it so
impressed and influenced me that whatever is due me as credit for my
share in the matter, is largely, if not wholly, due to James Lemen's
advice and most righteous counsel."[5]
Before this transfer was effected, it appears that Jefferson had
entered into negotiations with his young protégé with a view to
inducing him to locate in the "Illinois country" as his agent, in
order to co-operate with himself in the effort to exclude slavery from
the entire Northwest Territory. Mr. Lemen makes record of an interview
with Jefferson under date of December 11, 1782, as follows: "Thomas
Jefferson had me to visit him again a short time ago, as he wanted me
to go to the Illinois country in the Northwest after a year or two, in
order to try to lead and direct the new settlers in the best way, and
also to oppose the introduction of slavery into that country at a
later day, as I am known as an opponent of that evil; and he says he
will give me some help. It is all because of his great kindness and
affection for me, for which I am very grateful; but I have not yet
fully decided to do so, but have agreed to consider the case." In May,
1784, they had another interview, on the eve of Jefferson's departure
on his prolonged mission to France. Mr. Lemen's memorandum reads: "I
saw Jefferson at Annapolis, Maryland, to-day, and had a very pleasant
visit with him. I have consented to go to Illinois on his mission, and
he intends helping me some; but I did not ask nor wish it. We had a
full agreement and understanding as to all terms and duties. The
agreement is strictly private between us, but all his purposes are
perfectly honorable and praiseworthy."[6]
Thus the mission was undertaken which proved to be his life-work. He
had intended starting with his father-in-law, Captain Ogle, in 1785,
but was detained by illness in his family. December 28, 1785, he
records: "Jefferson's confidential agent gave me one hundred dollars
of his funds to use for my family, if need be, and if not, to go to
good causes; and I will go to Illinois on his mission next spring and
take my wife and children."
Such {p.11} was the origin and nature of the so-called
"Jefferson-Lemen Secret Anti-Slavery Compact," the available evidence
concerning which will be given at the conclusion of this paper.[7] The
anti-slavery propaganda of James Lemen and his circle constituted a
determining factor in the history of the first generation of Illinois
Baptists. To what extent Lemen co-operated with Jefferson in his
movements will appear as we proceed with the story of his efforts to
make Illinois a free State.
The "Old Dominion" ceded her "county of Illinois" to the National
domain in 1784. Jefferson's effort to provide for the exclusion of
slavery from the new Territory at that date proved abortive.
Consequently, when James Lemen arrived at the old French village of
Kaskaskia in July, 1786, he found slavery legally entrenched in all
the former French possessions in the "Illinois country." It had been
introduced by Renault, in 1719, who brought 500 negroes from Santo
Domingo (then a French possession) to work the mines which he expected
to develop in this section of the French Colonial Empire.[8] It is a
noteworthy fact that slavery was established on the soil of Illinois
just a century after its introduction on the shores of Virginia. When
the French possessions were taken over by Great Britain at the close
of the colonial struggle in 1763, that country guaranteed the French
inhabitants the possession of all their property, including slaves.
When Col. Clark, of Virginia, took possession of this region in 1778,
the State likewise guaranteed the inhabitants the full enjoyment of
all their property rights. By the terms of the Virginia cession of
1784 to the National Government, all the rights and privileges of the
former citizens of Virginia were assured to them in the ceded
district. Thus, at the time of Lemen's arrival, slavery had been
sanctioned on the Illinois prairies for sixty-seven years. One year
from the date of his arrival, however, the Territorial Ordinance of
1787 was passed, with the prohibition of slavery, as originally
proposed by Jefferson in 1784.[9] Thus it would seem that the desired
object had already been attained. By the terms of the famous "Sixth
Article of Compact," contained in that Ordinance, it was declared that
"there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said
Territory, otherwise than in the punishment of crimes whereof the
accused shall have been duly convicted." This looks like a sweeping
and final disposition of {p.12} the matter, but it was not accepted
as such until the lapse of another fifty-seven years. But neither
Jefferson nor his agents on the ground had anticipated so easy a
victory. Indeed, they had foreseen that a determined effort would be
made by the friends of slavery to legalize that institution in the
Territory. Almost at once, in fact, the conflict commenced, which was
to continue actively for thirty-seven years. Like the Nation itself,
the Illinois country was to be for a large part of its history "half
slave and half free"--both in sentiment and in practice.
Two attempts against the integrity of the "Sixth Article" were made
during Gov. St. Clair's administration. The trouble began with the
appeals of the French slave-holders against the loss of their
slaves.[10] As civil administration under the Territorial government
was not established among the Illinois settlements until 1790, both
the old French inhabitants and the new American colonists suffered all
manner of disabilities and distresses in the interval between 1784 and
1790, while just across the Mississippi there was a settled and
prosperous community under the Spanish government of Louisiana. When,
therefore, the French masters appealed to Gen. St. Clair, in 1787, to
protect them against the loss of the principal part of their wealth,
represented by their slaves, he had to face the alternative of the
loss of these substantial citizens by migration with their slaves to
the Spanish side of the river. And, in order to pacify these
petitioners, St. Clair gave it as his opinion that the prohibition of
slavery in the Ordinance was not retroactive, and hence did not affect
the rights of the French masters in their previously acquired slave
property. As this view accorded with the "compact" contained in the
Virginia deed of cession, it was sanctioned by the old Congress, and
was later upheld by the new Federal Government; and this construction
of the Ordinance of 1787 continued to prevail in Illinois until 1845,
when the State Supreme Court decreed that the prohibition was
absolute, and that, consequently, slavery in any form had never had
any legal sanction in Illinois since 1787.[11]
It does not appear that Mr. Lemen took any active measures against
this construction of the anti-slavery ordinance at the time. He was,
indeed, himself a petitioner, with other American settlers on the
"Congress lands" in Illinois, for the recognition of their claims,
which were menaced {p.13} by the general prohibition of settlement
then in effect.[12] Conditions in every respect were so insecure prior
to the organization of St. Clair county in 1790, that it was hardly to
be expected that any vigorous measure could be taken against
previously existing slavery in the colony, especially as the Americans
were then living in station forts for protection against the hostile
Indians. Moreover, Jefferson was not in the country in 1787, and hence
there was no opportunity for co-operation with him at this time. Mr.
Lemen was, however, improving the opportunity "to try to lead and
direct the new settlers in the best way"; for we find him, although
not as yet himself a "professor" of religion, engaged in promoting the
religious observance of the Sabbath on the part of the "godfearing"
element in the station fort where, with his father-in-law, he resided
(Fort Piggott). In 1789 Jefferson returned from France to become
Secretary of State in President Washington's cabinet, under the new
Federal Government. He had not forgotten his friend Lemen, as Dr. Peck
assures us that "he lost no time in sending him a message of love and
confidence by a friend who was then coming to the West."
St. Clair's construction of the prohibition of slavery unfortunately
served to weaken even its preventive force and emboldened the
pro-slavery advocates to seek persistently for the repeal, or, at
least, the "suspension" of the obnoxious Sixth Article. A second
effort was made under his administration in 1796, when a memorial,
headed by Gen. John Edgar, was sent to Congress praying for the
suspension of the Article. The committee of reference, of which the
Hon. Joshua Coit of Connecticut was chairman, reported adversely upon
this memorial, May 12, 1796.[13] It is not possible to state
positively Lemen's influence, if any, in the defeat of this appeal of
the leading citizens of the old French villages. But, as it was in
this same year that the first Protestant church in the bounds of
Illinois was organized in his house, and, as we are informed that he
endeavored to persuade the constituent members of the New Design
church to oppose slavery, we may suppose that he was already taking an
active part in opposition to the further encroachments of slavery,
especially in his own community.
The effort to remove the prohibition was renewed under Gov. Wm. Henry
Harrison, during the connection of the Illinois {p.14} settlements
with the Indiana Territory, from 1800 to 1809. Five separate attempts
were made during these years, which coincide with the term of
President Jefferson, who had removed St. Clair to make room for Gen.
Harrison. Harrison, however, yielded to the pressure of the
pro-slavery element in the Territory to use his power and influence
for their side of the question. Although their proposals were thrice
favorably reported from committee, the question never came to a vote
in Congress. The first attempt during the Indiana period was that of a
pro-slavery convention, called at the instigation of the Illinois
contingent, which met at Vincennes, in 1803, under the chairmanship of
Gov. Harrison. Their memorial to Congress, requesting merely a
temporary suspension of the prohibition, was adversely reported from
committee in view of the evident prosperity of Ohio under the same
restriction, and because "the committee deem it highly dangerous and
inexpedient to impair a provision wisely calculated to promote the
happiness and prosperity of the Northwestern country, and to give
strength and security to that extensive frontier." Referring to this
attempt of "the extreme southern slave advocates ... for the
introduction of slavery," Mr. Lemen writes, under date of May 3, 1803,
that "steps must soon be taken to prevent that curse from being
fastened on our people." The same memorial was again introduced in
Congress in February, 1804, with the provisos of a ten-year limit to
the suspension and the introduction of native born slaves only, which,
of course, would mean those of the border-state breeders. Even this
modified proposal, although approved in committee, failed to move
Congress to action. Harrison and his supporters continued nevertheless
to press the matter, and he even urged Judge Lemen, in a personal
interview, to lend his influence to the movement for the introduction
of slavery. To this suggestion Lemen replied that "the evil attempt
would encounter his most active opposition, in every possible and
honorable manner that his mind could suggest or his means
accomplish."[14]
It was about this time that the Governor and judges took matters in
their own hands and introduced a form of indentured service, which,
although technically within the prohibition of _involuntary_
servitude, amounted practically to actual slavery. Soon after, in
order to give this institution a more secure legal sanction, by
legislative enactment, the {p.15} second grade of territorial
government was hastily and high-handedly forced upon the people for
this purpose. It was probably in view of these measures that Mr. Lemen
recorded his belief that President Jefferson "will find means to
overreach the evil attempts of the pro-slavery party." Early in the
year 1806 the Vincennes memorial was introduced into Congress for the
third time and again favorably reported from committee, but to no
avail. It was about this time, as we learn from his diary, that Mr.
Lemen "sent a messenger to Indiana to ask the churches and people
there to get up and sign a counter petition, to uphold freedom in the
Territory," circulating a similar petition in Illinois himself.[15]
A fourth attempt to bring the proposal before Congress was made in
January, 1807, in a formal communication from the Governor and
Territorial Legislature. The proposal was a third time favorably
reported by the committee of reference, but still without action by
the House. Finally, in November of the same year, President Jefferson
transmitted to Congress similar communications from the Indiana
government. This time the committee reported that "the citizens of
Clark county [in which was located the first Baptist church organized
in Indiana], in their remonstrance, express their sense of the
impropriety of the measure"; and that they also requested Congress not
to act upon the subject until the people had an opportunity to
formulate a State Constitution[16]. Commenting upon the whole
proceedings, Dr. Peck quotes Gov. Harrison to the effect that, though
he and Lemen were firm friends, the latter "had set his iron will
against slavery, and indirectly made his influence felt so strongly at
Washington and before Congress, that all the efforts to suspend the
anti-slavery clause in the Ordinance of 1787 failed."[17] Peck adds
that President Jefferson "quietly directed his leading confidential
friends in Congress steadily to defeat Gen. Harrison's petitions for
the repeal."[17]
It was about this time, September 10, 1807, that President Jefferson
thus expressed his estimate of James Lemen's services, in his letter
to Robert Lemen: "His record in the new country has fully justified my
course in inducing him to settle there with the view of properly
shaping events in the best interest of the people."[18] It was during
this period of the Indiana agitation for the introduction of slavery,
{p.16} as we learn from an entry in his diary dated September 10,
1806, that Mr. Lemen received a call from an agent of Aaron Burr to
solicit his aid and sympathy in Burr's scheme for a southwestern
empire, with Illinois as a Province, and an offer to make him
governor. "But I denounced the conspiracy as high treason," he says,
"and gave him a few hours to leave the Territory on pain of
arrest."[19] It should be noted that at this date he was not himself a
magistrate, which, perhaps, accounts for his apparent leniency towards
what he regarded as a treasonable proposal.
The year 1809, the date of the separation of Illinois from the Indiana
Territory, marks a crisis in the Lemen anti-slavery campaign in
Illinois.[20] The agitation under the Indiana government for the
further recognition of slavery in the Territory was mainly instigated
by the Illinois slave-holders and their sympathizers among the
American settlers from the slave states. The people of Indiana proper,
except those of the old French inhabitants of Vincennes, who were
possessed of slaves, were either indifferent or hostile towards
slavery. Its partisans in the Illinois counties of the Territory, in
the hope of promoting their object thereby, now sought division of the
Indiana Territory and the erection of a separate government for
Illinois at Kaskaskia. This movement aroused a bitter political
struggle in the Illinois settlements, one result of which was the
murder of young Rice Jones in the streets of Kaskaskia. The division
was advocated on the ground of convenience and opposed on the score of
expense. The divisionists, however, seem to have been animated mainly
by the desire to secure the introduction of slavery as soon as
statehood could be attained for their section. The division was
achieved in 1809, and with it the prompt adoption of the system of
indentured service already in vogue under the Indiana government. And
from that time forth the fight was on between the free-state and
slave-state parties in the new Territory. Throughout the independent
territorial history of Illinois, slavery was sanctioned partly by law
and still further by custom. Gov. Ninian Edwards, whose religious
affiliations were with the Baptists, not only sanctioned slavery, but,
as is well known, was himself the owner of slaves during the
territorial period.
It was in view of this evident determination to make of Illinois
Territory a slave state, that James Lemen, with Jefferson's approval,
took the radical step of organizing a {p.17} distinctively
anti-slavery church as a means of promoting the free-state cause.[21]
From the first, indeed, he had sought to promote the cause of
temperance and of anti-slavery in and through the church. He tells us
in his diary, in fact, that he "hoped to employ the churches as a
means of opposition to the institution of slavery."[21] He was reared
in the Presbyterian faith, his stepfather being a minister of that
persuasion; but at twenty years of age he embraced Baptist principles,
apparently under the influence of a Baptist minister in Virginia,
whose practice it was to bar from membership all who upheld the
institution of slavery. He thus identified himself with the struggles
for civil, religious, and industrial liberty, all of which were then
actively going on in his own state.
The name of "New Design," which became attached to the settlement
which he established on the upland prairies beyond the bluffs of the
"American Bottom," is said to have originated from a quaint remark of
his that he "had a 'new design' to locate a settlement south of
Bellefontaine" near the present town of Waterloo.[22] The name "New
Design," however, became significant of his anti-slavery mission; and
when, after ten years of pioneer struggles, he organized The Baptist
Church of Christ at New Design, in 1796, he soon afterwards induced
that body--the first Protestant church in the bounds of the present
State--to adopt what were known as "Tarrant's Rules Against Slavery."
The author of these rules, the Rev. James Tarrant, of Virginia, later
of Kentucky, one of the "emancipating preachers," eventually organized
the fraternity of anti-slavery Baptist churches in Kentucky, who
called themselves "Friends to Humanity."
From 1796 to 1809 Judge Lemen was active in the promotion of Baptist
churches and a Baptist Association. He labored to induce all these
organizations to adopt his anti-slavery principles, and in this he was
largely successful; but, with the increase of immigrant Baptists from
the slave states, it became increasingly difficult to maintain these
principles in their integrity. And when, in the course of the campaign
for the division of the Territory in 1808, it became apparent that the
lines between the free-state and the slave-state forces were being
decisively drawn, Lemen prepared to take a more radical stand in the
struggle. With this design in view he asked and obtained the formal
sanction of {p.18} his church as a licensed preacher. In the course
of the same year, 1808, he is said to have received a confidential
message from Jefferson "suggesting a division of the churches on the
question of slavery, and the organization of a church on a strictly
anti-slavery basis, for the purpose of heading a movement to make
Illinois a free state."[21] According to another, and more probable,
version of this story, when Jefferson learned, through a mutual friend
(Mr. S. H. Biggs), of Lemen's determination to force the issue in the
church to the point of division, if necessary, he sent him a message
of approval of his proposed course and accompanied it with a
contribution of $20 for the contemplated anti-slavery church.
The division of the Territory was effected early in the year 1809, and
in the summer of that year, after vainly trying to hold all the
churches to their avowed anti-slavery principles, Elder Lemen, in a
sermon at Richland Creek Baptist church, threw down the gauntlet to
his pro-slavery brethren and declared that he could no longer maintain
church fellowship with them. His action caused a division in the
church, which was carried into the Association at its ensuing meeting,
in October, 1809, and resulted in the disruption of that body into
three parties on the slavery question--the conservatives, the
liberals, and the radicals. The latter element, headed by "the Lemen
party," as it now came to be called, held to the principles of The
Friends to Humanity, and proposed to organize a branch of that order
of Baptists. When it came to the test, however, the new church was
reduced to a constituent membership consisting of some seven or eight
members of the Lemen family. Such was the beginning of what is now the
oldest surviving Baptist church in the State, which then took the name
of "The Baptized Church of Christ, Friends to Humanity, on Cantine
(Quentin) Creek." It is located in the neighborhood of the old Cahokia
mound. Its building, when it came to have one, was called "Bethel
Meeting House," and in time the church itself became known as "Bethel
Baptist Church."
The distinctive basis of this church is proclaimed in its simple
constitution, to which every member was required to subscribe:
"Denying union and communion with all persons holding the doctrine of
perpetual, involuntary, hereditary slavery." This church began its
career as "a family church," in the literal sense of the word; but it
prospered nevertheless, {p.19} until it became a numerically strong
and vigorous organization which has had an active and honorable career
of a hundred years' duration. Churches of the same name and principles
multiplied and maintained their uncompromising but discriminating
opposition to slavery so long as slavery remained a local issue; after
which time they were gradually absorbed into the general body of
ordinary Baptist churches.
During the period of the Illinois Territory, 1809 to 1818, Elder Lemen
kept up a most energetic campaign of opposition to slavery, by
preaching and rigorous church discipline in the application of the
rules against slavery. He himself was regularly ordained soon after
the organization of his anti-slavery church. His sons, James and
Joseph, and his brother-in-law, Benjamin Ogle, were equally active in
the ministry during this period, and, before its close, they had two
churches firmly established in Illinois, with others of the same order
in Missouri.
"The church, properly speaking, never entered politics," Dr. Peck
informs us, "but presently, when it became strong, the members all
formed what they called the 'Illinois Anti-Slavery League,' and it was
this body that conducted the anti-slavery contest."[23] The contest
culminated in the campaign for statehood in 1818.
At the beginning of that year the Territorial Legislature petitioned
Congress for an Enabling Act, which was presented by the Illinois
Delegate, Hon. Nathaniel Pope. As chairman of the committee to which
this petition was referred, he drew up a bill for such an act early in
the year. In the course of its progress through the House, he
presented an amendment to his own bill, which provided for the
extension of the northern boundary of the new state. According to the
provisions of the Ordinance of 1787, the line would have been drawn
through the southern border of Lake Michigan. Pope's amendment
proposed to extend it so as to include some sixty miles of frontage on
Lake Michigan, thereby adding fourteen counties, naturally tributary
to the lake region, to counterbalance the southern portion of the
State, which was connected by the river system with the southern slave
states. Gov. Thomas Ford states explicitly that Pope made this change
"upon his own responsibility, ... no one at that time having suggested
or requested it." This statement is directly contradicted in {p.20}
Dr. Peck's sketch of James Lemen, Sr., written in 1857. He therein
states that this extension was first suggested by Judge Lemen, who had
a government surveyor make a plat of the proposed extension, with the
advantages to the anti-slavery cause to be gained thereby noted on the
document, which he gave to Pope with the request to have it embodied
in the Enabling Act.[24] This statement was repeated and amplified by
Mr. Joseph B. Lemen in an article in _The Chicago Tribune_.[25] It is
a well-known fact that the vote of these fourteen northern counties
secured the State to the anti-slavery party in 1856; but as this
section of the State was not settled until long after its admission
into the Union, the measure, whatever its origin, had no effect upon
the Constitutional Convention. However, John Messinger, of New Design,
who surveyed the Military Tract and, later, also the northern boundary
line, may very well have made such a plat, either on his own motion or
at the suggestion of the zealous anti-slavery leader, with whom he was
well acquainted. As Messinger was later associated with Peck in the
Rock Spring Seminary, and in the publication of a sectional map of
Illinois, it would seem that Peck was in a position to know the facts
as well as Ford.
In the campaign for the election of delegates to the Constitutional
Convention, slavery was the only question seriously agitated. The
Lemen churches and their sympathizers were so well organized and so
determined in purpose that they made a very energetic and effective
campaign for delegates. Their organization for political purposes, as
Peck informs us, "always kept one of its members and several of its
friends in the Territorial Legislature; and five years before the
constitutional election in 1818, it had fifty resident agents--men of
like sympathies--quietly at work in the several settlements; and the
masterly manner in which they did their duty was shown by a poll which
they made of the voters some few weeks before the election, which, on
their side, varied only a few votes from the official count after the
election."[23]
It is difficult to determine from the meager records of the
proceedings, even including the Journal of the Convention recently
published, just what the complexion of the body was on the slavery
question. Mr. W. Kitchell, a descendant of one of the delegates,
states that there were twelve delegates that favored the recognition
of slavery by a {p.21} specific article in the Constitution, and
twenty-one that opposed such action. Gov. Coles, who was present as a
visitor and learned the sentiments of the prominent members, says that
many, but not a majority of the Convention, were in favor of making
Illinois a slave state.[26] During the session of the Convention an
address to The Friends of Freedom was published by a company of
thirteen leading men, including James Lemen, Sr., to the effect that a
determined effort was to be made in the Convention to give sanction to
slavery, and urging concerted action "to defeat the plans of those who
wish either a temporary or an unlimited slavery."[27] A majority of
the signers of this address were Lemen's Baptist friends, and its
phraseology points to him as its author.
James Lemen, Jr., was a delegate from St. Clair county and a member of
the committee which drafted the Constitution. In the original draft of
that instrument, slavery was prohibited in the identical terms of the
Ordinance of 1787, as we learn from the recently published journal of
the Convention. In the final draft this was changed to read: "Neither
slavery nor involuntary servitude shall hereafter be introduced," and
the existing system of indentured service was also incorporated. These
changes were the result of compromise, and Lemen consistently voted
against them. He was nevertheless one of the committee of three
appointed to revise and engross the completed instrument.
The result was a substantial victory for the Free-State Party; and had
the Convention actually overridden the prohibition contained in the
original Territorial Ordinance, as it was then interpreted, it is
evident, from the tone of the address to The Friends of Freedom, that
the Lemen circle would have made a determined effort to defeat the
measure in Congress.[27]
Dr. Peck, who, like Gov. Coles, was a visitor to the Convention, and
who had every opportunity to know all the facts, in summing up the
evidence in regard to the matter, declares it to be "conclusive that
Mr. Lemen created and organized the forces which confirmed Illinois,
if not the Northwest Territory, to freedom." Speaking of the current
impression that the question of slavery was not much agitated in
Illinois prior to the Constitutional Convention, Gov. Coles says: "On
the contrary, at a very early period of the settlement of Illinois,
the question was warmly agitated by zealous {p.22} advocates and
opponents of slavery," and that, although during the period of the
independent Illinois Territory the agitation was lulled, it was not
extinguished, "as was seen [from] its mingling itself so actively both
in the election and the conduct of the members of the Convention, in
1818."[26]
Senator Douglas, in a letter to James Lemen, Jr., is credited with
full knowledge of the "Jefferson-Lemen Anti-Slavery Compact" and a
high estimate of its significance in the history of the slavery
contest in Illinois and the Northwest Territory. "This matter assumes
a phase of personal interest with me," he says, "and I find myself,
politically, in the good company of Jefferson and your father. With
them everything turned on whether the people of the Territory wanted
slavery or not, ... and that appears to me to be the correct
doctrine."[28] Lincoln, too, in a letter to the younger James Lemen,
is quoted as having a personal knowledge of the facts and great
respect for the senior Lemen in the conflict for a free state in
Illinois. "Both your father and Lovejoy," he remarks, "were pioneer
leaders in the cause of freedom, and it has always been difficult for
me to see why your father, who was a resolute, uncompromising, and
aggressive leader, who boldly proclaimed his purpose to make both the
Territory and the State free, never aroused nor encountered any of
that mob violence which, both in St. Louis and in Alton, confronted
and pursued Lovejoy."[29] Of the latter he says: "His letters, among
your old family notes, were of more interest to me than even those of
Thomas Jefferson to your father."
Jefferson's connection with Lemen's anti-slavery mission in Illinois
was never made public, apparently, until the facts were published by
Mr. Joseph B. Lemen, of the third generation, in the later years of
his life, in connection with the centennary anniversaries of the
events involved. However, the "compact" was a matter of family
tradition, based upon a collection of letters and notes handed down
from father to son. Jefferson's reasons for keeping the matter secret,
as Dr. Peck explains, were, first, to prevent giving the impression
that he was seeking his own interests in the territories, and, second,
to avoid arousing the opposition of his southern friends who desired
the extension of slavery. Lemen, on the other hand, did not wish to
have it thought that his actions were controlled by political
considerations, or subject {p.23} to the will of another. Moreover,
when he learned that Jefferson was regarded as "an unbeliever," he is
said to have wept bitterly lest it should be thought that, in his work
for the church and humanity, he had been influenced by an "infidel";
and, sometime before his death, he exacted a promise of his sons and
the few friends who were acquainted with the nature of his compact
with Jefferson that they would not make it known while he lived.[30]
Under the influence of this feeling on the part of their father, the
family kept the facts to themselves and a few confidential friends
until after the lapse of a century, when the time came to commemorate
the achievements of their ancestor.
How much of the current tradition is fact and how much fiction is hard
to determine, as so little of the original documentary material is now
available. The collection of materials herewith presented consists of
what purport to be authentic copies of the original documents in
question. They are put in this form in the belief that their
significance warrants it, and in the hope that their publication may
elicit further light on the subject. These materials consist of three
sorts, viz.; a transcript of the Diary of James Lemen, Sr., a
manuscript History of the confidential relations of Lemen and
Jefferson, prepared by Rev. John M. Peck, and a series of letters from
various public men to Rev. James Lemen, Jr. The Diary and manuscript
"History" were located by the compiler of this collection among the
papers of the late Dr. Edward B. Lemen, of Alton, Illinois. These
documents are now in the possession of his son-in-law, Mr. Wykoff, who
keeps them in his bank vault. The collection of letters was published
at various times by Mr. Joseph B. Lemen, of Collinsville, Illinois, in
_The Belleville Advocate_, of Belleville, Illinois. The Diary is a
transcript of the original, attested by Rev. James Lemen, Jr. The
"History" is a brief sketch, in two chapters, prepared from the
original documents by Dr. Peck while he was pastor of the Bethel
Church, in June, 1851, and written at his dictation by the hand of an
assistant, as the document itself expressly states. Mr. Joseph Lemen,
who is responsible for the letters, is the son of Rev. James Lemen,
Jr., and one of the editors of the Lemen Family History. The editor of
_The Belleville Advocate_ states that Mr. Lemen has contributed to
various metropolitan newspapers in the political campaigns of his
party, from those of Lincoln to those of McKinley.[31] He also {p.24}
contributed extended sketches of the Baptist churches of St. Clair
county for one of the early histories of that county. He took an
active part in promoting the movement to commemorate his grandfather,
James Lemen, Sr., in connection with the centennary anniversaries of
the churches founded at New Design and Quentin Creek (Bethel).
The originals of these materials are said to have composed part of a
collection of letters and documents known as the "Lemen Family Notes,"
which has aroused considerable interest and inquiry among historians
throughout the country. The history of this collection is somewhat
uncertain. It was begun by James Lemen, Sr., whose diary, containing
his "Yorktown Notes" and other memoranda, is perhaps its most
interesting survival. While residing in the station fort on the
Mississippi Bottom during the Indian troubles of his early years in
the Illinois country, he made a rude walnut chest in which to keep his
books and papers. This chest, which long continued to be used as the
depository of the family papers, is still preserved, in the Illinois
Baptist Historical Collection, at the Carnegie Library, Alton,
Illinois. It is said that Abraham Lincoln once borrowed it from Rev.
James Lemen, Jr., for the sake of its historical associations, and
used it for a week as a receptacle for his own papers. Upon the death
of the elder Lemen the family notes and papers passed to James, Jr.,
who added to it many letters from public men of his wide circle of
acquaintance.
As the older portions of the collection were being worn and lost, by
loaning them to relatives and friends, copies were made of all the
more important documents, and the remaining originals were then placed
in the hands of Dr. J. M. Peck, who was at the time pastor of the
Bethel Church, to be deposited in the private safe of a friend of his
in St. Louis. As the slavery question was then (1851) at white heat,
it is not surprising that Dr. Peck advised the family to carefully
preserve all the facts and documents relating to their father's
anti-slavery efforts "until some future time," lest their premature
publication should disturb the peace of his church. As late as 1857 he
writes of "that dangerous element in many of the old letters bearing
on the anti-slavery contest of 1818," and adds, "With some of those
interested in that contest, in fifty years from this time, the
publication of these letters would create trouble between the
descendants of many of our old pioneer families."[6]
A {p.25} man by the name of J. M. Smith is suggested by Dr. Peck as
the custodian of the originals. When this gentleman died, the
documents in his care are supposed to have been either lost or
appropriated by parties unknown to the Lemen family. Mr. Joseph B.
Lemen relates that a certain party at one time represented to the
family that he had located the papers and offered, for a suitable
consideration, to recover them. This proved to be merely a scheme to
obtain money under false pretenses.[6] Various other accounts are
current of the disposition of the original papers; but as yet none of
them have been located.
The transcripts of the collection, made by James Lemen, Jr., came into
the hands of his son, Joseph Bowler Lemen, who is responsible for the
publication of various portions of the story, including some of the
letters entire. Even these copies, however, are not accessible at the
present time, except that of the Lemen Diary, as located by the
present writer. Joseph Lemen's account of the fate of the elusive
documents is given in full at the end of this publication. He there
states that every paper of any value was copied and preserved, but
even these copies were dissipated to a large extent. He also claims
that all the facts contained in these documents have been published in
one form or another, "except a very few, including Rev. James Lemen's
interviews with Lincoln, as written up by Mr. Lemen on ten pages of
legal cap paper." This Joseph B. Lemen is now far advanced in years,
has long been a recluse, and has the reputation of being "peculiar."
In a personal interview with him, the present writer could elicit no
further facts regarding the whereabouts of the "Lemen Family Notes."
Nevertheless, the discovery of the copy of the Lemen Diary and the
manuscript of Dr. Peck's "History" gives encouragement to hope for
further discoveries, which should be reported to the Chicago
Historical Society.
DOCUMENTS {p.26}
I. DIARY OF REV. JAMES LEMEN, SR.
Ridge Prairie, Ill. June 4, 1867.
The within notes are a true copy of the notes kept by the Rev. James
Lemen, Sr., when in the siege at Yorktown. The original notes were
fading out.
By his son, REV. JAMES LEMEN, Jr.
* * * * *
Near Yorktown, Va. Sep. 26, 1781.
My enlistment of two years expired some time ago, but I joined my
regiment to-day and will serve in this siege.
Quarters, near Yorktown, Sept. 27, 1781.
I was on one of the French ships to-day with my captain. There is a
great fleet of them to help us, it is said, if we fight soon.
Sept. 30, 1781, Near Yorktown.
Our regiment has orders to move forward this morning, and the main
army is moving.
Near Yorktown. Oct. 3, 1781.
I was detailed with four other soldiers to return an insane British
soldier who had come into our lines, as we don't want such prisoners.
Near Yorktown. Oct. 4, 1781.
I carried a message from my Colonel to Gen. Washington to-day. He
recognized me and talked very kindly and said the war would soon be
over, he thought. I knew Washington before the war commenced.
Near {p.27} Yorktown. Oct. 4, 1781.
I saw Washington and La Fayette looking at a French soldier and an
American soldier wrestling, and the American threw the Frenchman so
hard he limped off, and La Fayette said that was the way Washington
must do to Cornwallis.
Near Yorktown. Oct. 5, 1781.
Brother Robert is sick to-day, but was on duty. There was considerable
firing to-day. There will be a great fight soon.
Near Yorktown. Oct. 15, 1781.
I was in the assault which La Fayette led yesterday evening against
the British redoubt, which we captured. Our loss was nine killed and
thirty-four wounded.
Near Yorktown. Oct. 15, 1781.
Firing was very heavy along our lines on Oct. 9th and 10th. and with
great effect, but this redoubt and another was in our way and we
Americans under La Fayette captured one easily, but the French
soldiers who captured the other suffered heavily. They were also led
by a Frenchman.
Yorktown. Oct. 19, 1781.
Our victory is great and complete. I saw the surrender to-day. Our
officers think this will probably end the war.
* * * * *
Ridge Prairie, Ill. June 4, 1867.
I have examined the within notes and find them to be correct copies of
notes kept by Rev. James Lemen, Sr., which were fading out. He
originally kept his confidential notes, as to his agreement with
Thomas Jefferson, in a private book, but as this is intended for
publication at some future time, they are all copied together.
By his son, REV. JAMES LEMEN, Jr.
Harper's Ferry, Va. Dec. 11, 1782.
[5]Thomas Jefferson had me to visit him again a short time ago, as he
wanted me to go to the Illinois country in the North West, after a
year or two, in order to try to lead and {p.28} direct the new
settlers in the best way and also to oppose the introduction of
slavery in that country at a later day, as I am known as an opponent
of that evil, and he says he will give me some help. It is all because
of his great kindness and affection for me, for which I am very
grateful, but I have not yet fully decided to do so, but have agreed
to consider the case.
Dec. 20, 1782.
During the war, I served a two years' enlistment under Washington. I
do not believe in war except to defend one's country and home and in
this case I was willing to serve as faithfully as I could. After my
enlistment expired I served again in the army in my regiment under
Washington, during the siege of Yorktown, but did not again enlist, as
the officers thought the war would soon end.
May 2, 1784.
[6]I saw Jefferson at Annapolis, Maryland, to-day and had a very
pleasant visit with him. I have consented to go to Illinois on his
mission and he intends helping me some, but I did not ask nor wish it.
We had a full agreement and understanding as to all terms and duties.
The agreement is strictly private between us, but all his purposes are
perfectly honorable and praiseworthy.
Dec. 28, 1785.
Jefferson's confidential agent gave me one hundred dollars of his
funds to use for my family, if need be, and if not to go to good
causes, and I will go to Illinois on his mission next Spring and take
my wife and children.
Sept. 4, 1786.
In the past summer, with my wife and children I arrived at Kaskaskia,
Illinois, and we are now living in the Bottom settlement. On the Ohio
river my boat partly turned over and we lost a part of our goods and
our son Robert came near drowning.
May 10, 1787.
I am very well impressed with this new country, but we are still
living in the Bottom, as the Indians are unsafe. We prefer living on
the high lands and we shall get us a place there soon. People are
coming into this new country in increasing numbers.
New {p.29} Design, Ill. Feb. 26, 1794.
My wife and I were baptized with several others to-day in Fountain
Creek by Rev. Josiah Dodge. The ice had to be cut and removed first.
New Design, May 28, 1796.
Yesterday and to-day, my neighbors at my invitation, gathered at my
home and were constituted into a Baptist church, by Rev. David Badgley
and Joseph Chance.
New Design, Jan. 4, 1797.
We settled here some time ago and are well pleased with our place. It
is more healthy than the Bottom country. A fine sugar grove is near us
and a large lake with fine fish, and soil good, but the Indians are
not yet to be trusted. We have been here now a number of years and
have quite a farm in cultivation and fairly good improvements.
New Design, Jan. 6, 1798.
I have just returned with six of my neighbors from a hunt and land
inspection upon what is called Richland country and creek. We had made
our camp near that creek before. On the first Sunday morning in
December held religious services and on Monday went out to see the
land. We found fine prairie lands some miles north, south and east and
some timber lands along the water streams mostly. Game is plentiful
and we killed several deer and turkeys. It is a fine country.
New Design, May 3, 1803.
As Thomas Jefferson predicted they would do, the extreme southern
slave advocates are making their influence felt in the new territory
for the introduction of slavery and they are pressing Gov. William
Henry Harrison to use his power and influence for that end. Steps must
soon be taken to prevent that curse from being fastened on our people.
New Design, May 4, 1805.
At our last meeting, as I expected he would do, Gov. Harrison asked
and insisted that I should cast my influence for the introduction of
slavery here, but I not only denied the request, but I informed him
that the evil attempt would encounter my most active opposition in
every possible and honorable manner that my mind could suggest or my
means accomplish.
New {p.30} Design, May 10, 1805.
Knowing President Jefferson's hostility against the introduction of
slavery here and the mission he sent me on to oppose it, I do not
believe the pro-slavery petitions with which Gov. Harrison and his
council are pressing Congress for slavery here can prevail while he is
President, as he is very popular with Congress and will find means to
overreach the evil attempt of the pro-slavery power.
Jan. 20th 1806.
[15]As Gov. William Henry Harrison and his legislative council have
had their petitions before Congress at several sessions asking for
slavery here, I sent a messenger to Indiana to ask the churches and
people there to get up and sign a counter petition to Congress to
uphold freedom in the territory and I have circulated one here and we
will send it on to that body at next session or as soon as the work is
done.
New Design. Sept. 10, 1806.
[19]A confidential agent of Aaron Burr called yesterday to ask my aid
and sympathy in Burr's scheme for a Southwestern Empire with Illinois
as a province and an offer to make me governor. But I denounced the
conspiracy as high treason and gave him a few hours to leave the
territory on pain of arrest.
New Design. Jan 10, 1809 [1810].
[20]I received Jefferson's confidential message on Oct. 10, 1808,
suggesting a division of the churches on the question of slavery and
the organization of a church on a strictly anti-slavery basis, for the
purpose of heading a movement to finally make Illinois a free State,
and after first trying in vain for some months to bring all the
churches over to such a basis, I acted on Jefferson's plan and Dec.
10, 1809, the anti-slavery element formed a Baptist church at Cantine
creek, on an anti-slavery basis.
New Design. Mar. 3, 1819.
I was reared in the Presbyterian faith, but at 20 years of age I
embraced Baptist principles and after settlement in Illinois I was
baptized into that faith and finally became a minister of the gospel
of that church, but some years before I was licensed to preach, I was
active in collecting and inducing {p.31} communities to organize
churches, as I thought that the most certain plan to control and
improve the new settlements, and I also hoped to employ the churches
as a means of opposition to the institution of slavery, but this only
became possible when we organized a leading church on a strictly
anti-slavery basis, an event which finally was marked with great
success, as Jefferson suggested it would be.
New Design. Jan 10, 1820.
My six sons all are naturally industrious and they all enjoy the
sports. Robert and Josiah excel in fishing, Moses in hunting, William
in boating and swimming and James and Joseph in running and jumping.
Either one of them can jump over a line held at his own height, a
little over six feet.
New Design. Jan. 12, 1820.
A full account of my Indian fights will be found among my papers.
New Design. Dec. 10, 1820.
Looking back at this time, 1820, to 1809, when we organized the
Canteen creek Baptist Church on a strictly anti-slavery basis as
Jefferson had suggested as a [center] from which the anti-slavery
movement to finally save the State to freedom could be directed, it is
now clear that the move was a wise one as there is no doubt but that
it more than anything else was what made Illinois a free State.
New Design, Ill. Jan. 4, 1821.
Among my papers my family will find a full and connected statement as
to all the churches I have caused to be formed since my settlement in
Illinois.
* * * * *
There were many of our family notes which were faded out and Rev. J.
M. Peck retained some when he made father's history and many were
misplaced by other friends, but we have had all copied [that] are now
in our possession which are of interest.
REV. JAMES LEMEN, Jr.,
(Son of Rev. James Lemen, Sr.).
Ridge Prairie, Ill. June 4, 1867.
My father's account of his Indian fights and statement of all the
churches he caused to be founded in Illinois, above mentioned,
{p.32} were loaned to Rev. John M. Peck a short time before his death
and have not been returned, but the information contained has already
been published except a few confidential facts as to his relations
with Jefferson in the formation of the Canteen Creek Baptist Ch., now
the Bethel Baptist Church.
REV. JAMES LEMEN, Jr.
(Son of James Lemen, Sr.)
II. PECK'S HISTORY OF THE JEFFERSON-LEMEN COMPACT
Rock Spring, Ill., June 4, 1851.
The history of the confidential relation of Rev. James Lemen, Senior,
and Thomas Jefferson, and Lemen's mission under him, which I have
prepared for his son, Rev. James Lemen, Junior, at his request from
the family notes and diaries.
J. M. PECK,
Per A. M. W.
CHAPTER I.
The leading purpose of Thomas Jefferson in selecting James Lemen, of
Virginia, afterwards James Lemen, Senior, to go to Illinois as his
agent, was no doubt prompted by his great affection for Mr. Lemen and
his impression that a young man of such aptitude as a natural leader
would soon impress himself on the community, and as the advantages in
the territory were soon to be great, Jefferson was desirous to send
him out, and with the help of a few friends he provided a small fund
to give him, and also his friend who was going to Indiana on a like
mission, to be used by their families if need be, and if not to go to
good causes. There was also another motive with Jefferson; he looked
forward to a great pro-slavery contest to finally try to make Illinois
and Indiana slave states, and as Mr. Lemen was a natural born
anti-slavery leader and had proved himself such in Virginia by
inducing scores of masters to free their slaves through his prevailing
kindness of manner and Christian arguments, he was just Jefferson's
ideal of a man who could safely be trusted with his anti-slavery
mission in Illinois, and this was an important factor in his
appointment.
The last meeting between Mr. Lemen and Jefferson was at Annapolis,
Maryland, on May 2, 1784, a short time before he {p.33} sailed as
envoy to France, and all the terms between them were fully agreed
upon, and on Dec. 28, 1785, Jefferson's confidential agent gave Mr.
Lemen one hundred dollars of his funds, and in the summer of 1786 with
his wife and children he removed and settled in Illinois, at New
Design, in what is now Monroe County. A few years after his settlement
in Illinois Mr. Lemen was baptized into the Baptist church, and he
finally became a minister of the people of that faith. He eventually
became a great organizer of churches and by that fact, reinforced by
his other wonderful traits as a natural leader, he fully realized
Jefferson's fondest dreams and became a noted leader.
In 1789 Jefferson returned from his mission to France and his first
thought was of Mr. Lemen, his friend in Illinois, and he lost no time
in sending him a message of love and confidence by a friend who was
then coming to the West. [5]After Jefferson became President of the
United States he retained all of his early affection for Mr. Lemen,
and when S. H. Biggs, a resident of Illinois, who was in Virginia on
business and who was a warm friend of both Jefferson and Mr. Lemen,
called on him in 1808, when President, he inquired after him with all
the fondness of a father, and when told of Mr. Lemen's purpose to soon
organize a new church on a strictly anti-slavery basis Jefferson sent
him a message to proceed at once to form the new church and he sent it
a twenty-dollar contribution. Acting on Jefferson's suggestion, Mr.
Lemen promptly took the preliminary steps for the final formation of
the new church and when constituted it was called the Baptist Church
of Canteen Creek and Jefferson's contribution, with other funds, were
given to it. This church is now called the Bethel Baptist Church, and
it has a very interesting history.
But in view of the facts and circumstances the church might properly
have been called the "Thomas Jefferson Church," and what volumes these
facts speak for the beneficent and marvelous influence which Mr. Lemen
had over Jefferson, who was a reputed unbeliever. The great love he
had for James Lemen not only induced him to tolerate his churches but
he became an active adviser for their multiplication.
[30]The original agreement between Jefferson and Mr. Lemen was
strictly confidential; on the part of Jefferson, because, had it been
known, his opponents would have said {p.34} he sent paid emissaries
to Illinois and Indiana to shape matters to his own interests, and the
extreme South might have opposed his future preferment, if it were
known that he had made an anti-slavery pact with his territorial
agents; and it was secret on the part of Mr. Lemen because he never
wished Jefferson to give him any help and his singularly independent
nature made him feel that he would enjoy a greater liberty of action,
or feeling at least, if it were never known that his plans and
purposes to some extent were dictated and controlled by another, not
even by his great and good friend Jefferson; so the agreement between
them was strictly private. [30]And there was another circumstance
which finally determined Mr. Lemen to always preserve the secrecy, and
that was that some of Mr. Jefferson's opponents shortly before Mr.
Lemen's death informed him that he had become an absolute unbeliever,
and this so impressed his mind that he wept bitterly for fear, if the
fact should ever be known that he had an agreement with Jefferson,
that they would say that he was in alliance with an unbeliever in the
great life work he had performed, and he exacted a promise from his
sons, his brother-in-law, Rev. Benjamin Ogle, and Mr. Biggs, the only
persons who then knew of the agreement, that they would never divulge
it during his lifetime, a pledge they all religiously kept, and in
later years they told no one but the writer and a few other trusted
friends who have not, and never will, betray them. But the writer
advised them to carefully preserve all the facts and histories we are
now writing and to tell some of their families and let them publish
them at some future time, as much of the information is of public
interest.
As to Jefferson's being an absolute unbeliever, his critics were
mistaken. He held to the doctrine that the mind and the reason are the
only guides we have to judge of the authenticity and credibility of
all things, natural and divine, and this appears to have been the
chief basis on which Jefferson's critics based their charges against
him. But while these harsh criticisms in some measure misled Mr. Lemen
he never lost his great love for Jefferson and to the latest day of
his life he always mentioned his name with tenderness and affection. I
had hoped to complete this history in one chapter, but there appear to
be notes and materials enough for another. By oversight the notes of
Mr. Lemen's war record were not given me, but he honorably served an
enlistment of {p.35} two years under Washington, and returned to his
regiment at the siege of Yorktown and served until the surrender of
Cornwallis, but did not re-enlist.
CHAPTER II.
At their last meeting at Annapolis, Maryland, on May 2, 1784, when the
final terms in their agreement as to Mr. Lemen's mission in Illinois
were made, both he and Jefferson agreed that sooner or later, there
would be a great contest to try to fasten slavery on the Northwestern
Territory, and this prophesy was fully verified in spite of the fact
that Congress, at a later period, passed the Ordinance of 1787 forever
forbidding slavery; two contests arose in Illinois, the first to
confirm the territory and the second to confirm the state to freedom.
[17]From 1803 for several successive congresses Gen. William Henry
Harrison, then governor of the Northwestern Territory, with his
legislative council petitioned that body to repeal the anti-slavery
clause in the Ordinance of 1787 and to establish slavery in the
territory, but without avail, and finally recognizing that the
influence of Rev. James Lemen, Sr., was paramount with the people of
Illinois, he made persistent overtures for his approval of his
pro-slavery petitions, but he declined to act and promptly sent a
messenger to Indiana, paying him thirty dollars of the Jefferson fund
given him in Virginia to have the church and people there sign a
counter petition, meanwhile circulating one in Illinois among the
Baptists and others; and at the next session of Congress Gen.
Harrison's pro-slavery petitions for the first time encountered the
anti-slavery petitions of the Baptist people and others, and the
senate, before which the matter went at that time, voted to sustain
the anti-slavery petitions and against the repeal of the anti-slavery
clause in the Ordinance of 1787, and for the time the contest ended.
[21]The next anti-slavery contest was in the narrower limits of the
territory of Illinois, and it began with the events which called the
Bethel Baptist Church into existence. When Mr. Lemen received
President Jefferson's message in 1808 to proceed at once to organize
the next church on an anti-slavery basis and make it the center from
which the anti-slavery forces should act to finally make Illinois a
free state, he decided to act on it; but as he knew it would create a
{p.36} division in the churches and association, to disarm criticism
he labored several months to bring them over to the anti-slavery
cause, but finding that impossible he adopted Jefferson's advice and
prepared to open the contest. The first act was on July 8, 1809, in
regular session of the Richland Creek Baptist Church, where the people
had assembled from all quarters to see the opening of the anti-slavery
contest, when Rev. James Lemen, Sr., arose and in a firm but friendly
Christian spirit declared it would be better for both sides to
separate, as the contest for and against slavery must now open and not
close until Illinois should become a state. A division of both the
association and the churches followed, but finally at a great meeting
at the Richland Creek Baptist Church in a peaceful and Christian
manner, as being the better policy for both sides, separation was
adopted by unanimous vote and a number of members withdrew, and on
Dec. 10, 1809, they formed the "Baptist Church at Canteen Creek," (now
Bethel Baptist Church). Their articles of faith were brief. They
simply declared the Bible to be the pillar of their faith, and
proclaimed their good will for the brotherhood of humanity by
declaring their church to be "The Baptist Church of Christ, Friends to
Humanity, denying union and communion with all persons holding the
doctrine of perpetual, involuntary, hereditary slavery."
[23]The church, properly speaking, never entered politics, but
presently, when it became strong, the members all formed what they
called "The Illinois Anti-Slavery League," and it was this body that
conducted the anti-slavery contest. It always kept one of its members
and several of its friends in the Territorial Legislature, and five
years before the constitutional election in 1818 it had fifty resident
agents--men of like sympathies--in the several settlements throughout
the territory quietly at work, and the masterly manner in which they
did their duty was shown by a poll which they made of the voters some
few weeks before the election, which, on their side only varied a few
votes from the official count after the election. [17]With people
familiar with all the circumstances there is no divergence of views
but that the organization of the Bethel Church and its masterly
anti-slavery contest saved Illinois to freedom; but much of the credit
of the freedom of Illinois, as well as for the balance of the
territory, was due to Thomas Jefferson's faithful and efficient aid.
True to his promise to Mr. Lemen that slavery should {p.37} never
prevail in the Northwestern Territory or any part of it, he quietly
directed his leading confidential friends in Congress to steadily
defeat Gen. Harrison's pro-slavery petitions for the repeal of the
anti-slavery clause in the Ordinance of 1787, and his friendly aid to
Rev. James Lemen, Sr., and friends made the anti-slavery contest of
Bethel Church a success in saving the state to freedom.
In the preparation of this history, to insure perfect reliability and
a well-connected statement, I have examined, selected, and read the
numerous family notes myself, dictating, while my secretary has done
the writing, and after all was completed we made another critical
comparison with all the notes to insure perfect accuracy and
trustworthiness.
I have had one copy prepared for Rev. James Lemen, Jr., and one for
myself. I should have added that of the one hundred dollars of the
Jefferson funds given him Rev. James Lemen, Sr., used none for his
family, but it was all used for other good causes, as it was not Mr.
Lemen's intention to appropriate any of it for his own uses when he
accepted it from Jefferson's confidential agent in Virginia.
III. "HOW ILLINOIS GOT CHICAGO"
(Communication from Joseph B. Lemen, under head of "Voice of the
People," in _The Chicago Tribune_ some time in December, 1908.)
O'Fallon, Ill., Dec. 21, 1908.
Editor of the Tribune:--In October, 1817, the Rev. James Lemen, Sr.,
had a government surveyor make a map showing how the boundary of
Illinois could be extended northward so as to give a growing state
more territory and a better shape and include the watercourses by
which Lake Michigan might be connected with the Mississippi river.
With these advantages marked in the margin of the map, he gave his
plan and map to Nathaniel Pope, our territorial delegate in congress,
to secure the adoption of the plan by that body, which he did.
The facts were noted in the Rev. J. M. Peck's pioneer papers and
others, and in commenting on them some of our newspapers have recently
charged Nathaniel Pope with carelessness in not publishing Mr. Lemen's
share in the matter, but unjustly. Mr. Lemen and Mr. Pope were ardent
friends, and as the former was a preacher and desired no office, and
he wished and sought for no private preferment and {p.38} promotion,
he expressly declared that as Mr. Pope had carried the measure through
Congress with such splendid skill he preferred that he should have the
credit and not mention where he got the map and plan.
Rev. Benjamin Ogle, Mr. Lemen's brother-in-law, and others mentioned
this fact in some of their papers and notes. The omission was no fault
of Mr. Pope's and was contrary to his wish.
The present site of Chicago was included in the territory added, and
that is how Illinois got Chicago.
PIONEER.
IV. ADDRESS TO THE FRIENDS OF FREEDOM
(From _The Illinois Intelligencer_, August 5, 1818.)
The undersigned, happening to meet at the St. Clair Circuit Court,
have united in submitting the following Address to the Friends of
Freedom in the State of Illinois.
Feeling it a duty in those who are sincere in their opposition to the
toleration of slavery in this territory to use all fair and laudable
means to effect that object, we therefore beg leave to present to our
fellow-citizens at large the sentiments which prevail in this section
of our country on that subject. In the counties of Madison and St.
Clair, the most populous counties in the territory, a sentiment
approaching unanimity seems to prevail against it. In the counties of
Bond, Washington, and Monroe a similar sentiment also prevails. We are
informed that strong exertions will be made in the convention to give
sanction to that deplorable evil in our state; and lest such should be
the result at too late a period for anything like concert to take
place among the friends of freedom in trying to defeat it, we
therefore earnestly solicit all true friends to freedom in every
section of the territory to unite in opposing it, both by the election
of a Delegate to Congress who will oppose it and by forming meetings
and preparing remonstrances against it. Indeed, so important is this
question considered that no exertions of a fair character should be
omitted to defeat the plan of those who wish either a temporary or
unlimited slavery. Let us also select men to the Legislature who will
unite in remonstrating to the general government against ratifying
such a constitution. At a crisis like this thinking will not do,
_acting_ is necessary.
From {p.39} St. Clair county--Risdon Moore, Benjamin Watts, Jacob
Ogle, Joshua Oglesby, William Scott, Sr., William Biggs, Geo. Blair,
Charles R. Matheny, James Garretson, and [34]William Kinney.
From Madison County--Wm. B. Whiteside.
From Monroe County--James Lemen, Sr.
From Washington--Wm. H. Bradsby.
V. RECOLLECTIONS OF A CENTENNARIAN
By DR. WILLIAMSON F. BOYAKIN, Blue Rapids, Kansas (1807-1907)
(_The Standard_, Chicago, November 9, 1907.)
The Lemen family was of Irish [Scotch] descent. They were friends and
associates of Thomas Jefferson. It was through his influence that they
migrated West. When the Lemen family arrived at what they designated
as New Design, in the vicinity of the present town of Waterloo, in
Monroe county, twenty-five miles southeast of the city of St. Louis,
Illinois was a portion of the state of Virginia. [Ceded to U. S. two
years previous.]
Thomas Jefferson gave them a kind of carte blanche for all the then
unoccupied territory of Virginia, and gave them $30 in gold to be paid
to the man who should build the first meeting house on the western
frontier.[32] This rudely-constructed house of worship was built on a
little creek named Canteen [Quentin], just a mile or two south of what
is now called Collinsville, Madison county, Illinois.
In the mountains of Virginia there lived a Baptist minister by the
name of Torrence. This Torrence, at an Association in Virginia,
introduced a resolution against slavery. In a speech in favor of the
resolution he said, "All friends of humanity should support the
resolution." The elder James Lemen being present voted for it and
adopted it for his motto, inscribed it on a rude flag, and planted it
on the rudely-constructed flatboat on which the family floated down
the Ohio river, in the summer of 1790 [1786], to the New Design
location.[33]
The distinguishing characteristic of the churches and associations
that subsequently grew up in Illinois [under the Lemen influence] was
the name "The Baptized Church of Christ, Friends to Humanity."
One {p.40} of these Lemen brothers, Joseph, married a Kinney, sister
to him who was afterwards governor [lieutenant governor] of the state.
This Kinney was also a Baptist preacher, a Kentuckian, and a
pro-slavery man.[34] When the canvass opened in 1816, 17, and 18 to
organize Illinois into a state, the Lemens and the Kinneys were
leaders in the canvass. The canvass was strong, long, bitter. The
Friends to Humanity party won. The Lemen brothers made Illinois what
it is, a free state.
The Lemens were personally fine specimens of the genus homo--tall,
straight, large, handsome men--magnetic, emotional, fine speakers.
James Lemen [Junior] was considered the most eloquent speaker of the
day of the Baptist people. Our present educated preachers have lost
the hold they should have upon the age in the cultivation of the
intellectual instead of the emotional. Religion is the motive power in
the intellectual guidance of humanity. These Lemens were well balanced
in the cultivation of the intellect and the control of the emotions.
They were well educated for their day, self-educated, great lovers of
poetry, hymnal poetry, having no taste for the religious debates now
so prevalent in some localities. They attended no college
commencements [?]. James Lemen, however, at whose grave the monument
is to be erected, was for fourteen consecutive years in the Senate of
the State Legislature, and would have been elected United States
senator, but he would not accept the position when offered. [This was
James, Jr., not his father.]
Personally of fine taste, always well and even elegantly dressed, they
rode fine horses, owned fine farms, well cultivated. They lived in
rich, elegant style [?]. They were brimful and overflowing with
spontaneous hospitality. All were married, with several sisters, and
were blessed with large families. Almost all of them, parents and
descendants, have passed away. Old Bethel, the church house, and the
graveyard, in sight of the old mound, are yet there.
NOTE.--Dr. Boyakin was a physician, Baptist minister, and newspaper
editor for many years in Illinois. He delivered the G. A. R. address
at Blue Rapids, Kansas, on his one hundredth birthday. He has confused
some things in these "recollections," especially the story concerning
the origin of the name "Friends to Humanity," but for his years his
statements are unusually in accord with the facts.
VI. {p.41} IN MEMORY OF REV. JAMES LEMEN, SR.
BY A WELL-WISHER
(_The Standard_, Chicago, November 16, 1907)
When James Lemen's early anti-slavery Baptist churches went over to
the cause of slavery, it looked as if all were lost and his
anti-slavery mission in Illinois had failed. At that crisis Mr. Lemen
could have formed another sect, but in his splendid loyalty to the
Baptist cause he simply formed another Baptist church on the broader,
higher grounds for both God and humanity, and on this high plane he
unfurled the banner of freedom. In God's good time the churches and
state and nation came up to that grand level of right, light, and
progress.
Of James Lemen's sons, under his training, Robert was an eminent
Baptist layman, and Joseph, James, Moses, and Josiah were able Baptist
preachers. [William, the "wayward" son, also became a useful minister
in his later years.] Altogether they were as faithful a band of men as
ever stood for any cause. This is the rating which history places upon
them. The country owes James Lemen another debt of gratitude for his
services to history. He and his sons were the only family that ever
kept a written and authentic set of notes of early Illinois; and the
early historians, Ford, Reynolds, and Peck, drew many of their facts
from that source. These notes embraced the only correct histories of
both the early Methodist and the early Baptist churches in Illinois
and much other early matter.[35]
NOTE.--This communication was probably from Dr. W. F. Boyakin.
VII. STATEMENT REGARDING JOSEPH B. LEMEN
"Joseph B. Lemen has written editorially for _The New York Sun_, _The
New York Tribune_, _The Chicago Tribune_, _and The Belleville
Advocate_.
"During the McKinley campaign of 1896 he wrote editorials from the
farmers' standpoint for a number of the metropolitan newspapers of the
country at the personal request of Mark Hanna.
"He also wrote editorials for the metropolitan newspapers during the
first Lincoln campaign."
--Editor, _Belleville Advocate_.
December, 1912.
VIII. {p.42} HISTORIC LETTER OF REV. J. M. PECK ON THE OLD LEMEN
FAMILY NOTES
(From _Belleville Advocate_, January, 1908)
(Clipping in I.B.H.C., K11)
To the Editor of the Belleville Advocate:
We herewith send the Advocate a copy of a letter of the eminent
historian and great Baptist divine, the late Rev. J. M. Peck, to his
old ministerial associate, the late Rev. James Lemen, concerning the
anti-slavery labors of his father, Rev. James Lemen, Sr., and also his
views as to the old Lemen family notes, which will perhaps interest
your readers. It seems quite appropriate for the Advocate to print
these old pioneer matters, as it is one of the old pioneer landmarks.
Rev. James Lemen took the paper when it started, under its first name,
and it has come to his family or family members at his old home ever
since.
By order of the Family.
[JOSEPH B. LEMEN.]
REV. JAMES LEMEN, SR., AND HIS ANTI-SLAVERY LABORS
Rev. James Lemen,
Ridge Prairie, Illinois
Dear Brother: At my recent very enjoyable visit at your house you made
two important requests, which I will now answer. The first was as to
my estimate or judgment of your father's anti-slavery labors, and the
second was as to what disposition you had better make of your vast
stock of old family notes and papers. Considering your questions in
the order named, I will write this letter, or more properly, article,
under the above heading of "Rev. James Lemen, Sr., and His
Anti-Slavery Labors," as the first question is the most important, and
then in conclusion I will notice the second.
In considering your father's anti-slavery labors, I will proceed upon
the facts and evidence obtained outside your old family notes, as it
might be presumed that the trend of the notes on that matter would be
partial. Not that the facts I would use are not found in your family
notes, for they appear to cover about every event in our early state
and church history; but that I would look for the facts elsewhere to
prove the matter, and indeed I can draw largely from my own {p.43}
knowledge of the facts upon which your father's success as an
anti-slavery leader rested. Not only from my own personal observation,
but scores of the old pioneers, your father's followers and helpers,
have given me facts that fully establish the claim that he was the
chief leader that saved Illinois to freedom. Not only the state, but
on a wider basis the evidence is very strong that Rev. James Lemen,
Sr., largely shared in saving the Northwestern Territory for free
states. This was the estimate that General [Governor] William Henry
Harrison placed on his labors in his letter to Captain Joseph Ogle
after his term of the governorship had expired. [17]In his letter
to Captain Ogle he said that, though he and Mr. Lemen were ardent
friends, he [Lemen] set his iron will against slavery here and
indirectly made his influence felt so strongly at Washington and
before Congress, that all efforts to suspend the anti-slavery clause
in the Ordinance of 1787 failed.
But James Lemen was not only a factor which saved the anti-slavery
clause in the Ordinance of 1787, but there is no doubt, after putting
all the facts together, ... that his anti-slavery mission to the
Northwestern Territory was inspired by the same cause which finally
placed the anti-slavery clause in the Ordinance, and that Lemen's
mission and that clause were closely connected. Douglas, Trumbull, and
Lincoln thought so, and every other capable person who had [been] or
has been made familiar with the facts.
Many of the old pioneers to whom the facts were known have informed me
that all the statements as to Rev. James Lemen's anti-slavery teaching
and preaching and forming his anti-slavery churches, and conducting
the anti-slavery contest, and sending a paid agent to Indiana to
assist the anti-slavery cause, were all true in every particular; and
so the evidence outside and independently of that in the Lemen family
notes is conclusive that Mr. Lemen created and organized the forces
which finally confirmed Illinois, if not the Northwestern Territory,
to freedom. But there was just one fact that made it possible for the
old pioneer leader practically single handed and alone to accomplish
such results; and that was because President Jefferson's great power
was behind him, and through his secret influence Congress worked for
the very purpose that Jefferson, more than twenty years before, had
sent Lemen to Illinois, or the Northwestern Territory, to secure,
namely, the freedom of the new {p.44} country. The claim that Mr.
Lemen encompassed these great results would, of course, be ridiculous
were it not known that the power of the government through Jefferson
stood behind him. Hence Douglas, Trumbull, and others are correct, and
I quite agree with them, that when you publish the old family notes on
the matter, if, for reasons you state, you do not wish to publish
Jefferson's letters to your father which concern the subject, it will
be sufficient just to say he acted by and under his advice and aid,
and people will accept it, as it is self-evident, because it is
preposterous to hold that Mr. Lemen could have accomplished such
results without some great power behind him. In conclusion, it is my
judgment that your father's anti-slavery labors were the chief factor
leading up to the free state constitution for Illinois.
Now as to your old family notes. They are valuable. In their
respective fields, they embrace by far the most trustworthy history in
our state. They ought to be preserved, but your generous nature will
not permit you to say no; and your friends, as you say, are carrying
them off, and they will all be lost, and presently the vast and
priceless collection will have disappeared, which will be an
unspeakable loss. Like your friends, Dr. B. F. Edwards and J. M.
Smith, I would advise you to make copies of all to keep for use, and
then give Smith the old collection to keep and hold in St. Louis in
his safe, and leave them there for good. This will save you an
infinite amount of worry, as people will not trouble you to see the
mere copies. It would be a good disposition to make of them, and thus
bury that dangerous element in many of the old letters bearing on the
anti-slavery contest of 1818. With some of those interested in that
contest, in fifty years from this time, the publication of these
letters would create trouble between the descendants of many of our
old pioneer families.
There is a danger lurking in many of these old collections where you
would not suspect it. In 1851, when I wrote the first or preliminary
part of the Bethel church history from your old family notes, now
generally referred to as the history of the "Jefferson-Lemen
Anti-Slavery Pact," and part second as the history proper of the
church in the letter which was simply the history from its
organization in 1809 to my pastorate of 1851, I carefully omitted all
mention of the anti-slavery contest which gave the church its origin.
I {p.45} did this so that that part of its history could then be
recorded in the church book, which could not have been done had I
mentioned the anti-slavery contest; because the bitterness of that
period had not yet fully disappeared; and the full history of the
church, with the causes creating, and the results flowing from its
organization, if recorded or published then, would have aroused
considerable ill feeling against the church in some parts of the
state. So part second, or the history proper, was only recorded at
that time. But having lately completed part third of the Bethel church
history, showing the results of its organization, I sent it with a
copy of part first, or the history of the Jefferson Lemen Anti-Slavery
Pact, to our worthy and noble Christian brother, the Bethel church
clerk, James H. Lemen, and the other brother whose name you suggested,
and they can place them in safe keeping somewhere until after your old
family notes are published, and then they should be recorded in the
church book with the church history proper and all the papers be
placed with the other church papers. I shall also send them a copy of
this letter to be finally placed with the church papers, as it is in
part the history of the founder of that church, all parties agreeing
that your father created, though of course he did not formally
constitute, it. The old church, when all the facts become known, will
become noted in history, as it stands as the monument of the contest
which began by putting the anti-slavery clause in the Ordinance of
1787, and which concluded by making Illinois and her neighboring
sisters free states.
As to the more valuable letters in your family notes and collections,
I have kept them securely for you. Douglas' and Lincoln's letters take
very correct views as to your father's anti-slavery labors, and
Jefferson's two letters to your father disclose his great friendship
for him, and show that he placed the greatest confidence and trust in
him. Poor Lovejoy's letter reads as if he had a presentment of his
coming doom. There is no more interesting feature in all your old
family notes than Lincoln's views at your many meetings with him, and
your copy of his prayer is beautiful. Some of his views on Bible
themes are very profound; but then he is a very profound thinker. It
now looks as if he would become a national leader. Would not he and
your father have enjoyed a meeting on the slavery question? I put all
the letters with the other papers you gave me in a safe {p.46} in St.
Louis, in a friend's care, where I sometimes put my papers. Your son,
Moses, was with me and the check is given in his name. This will
enable you to tell your friends that the papers are not now in your
custody, and they will not bother you to see them. Hoping to see you
soon, I remain as ever.
Fraternally yours,
Rock Spring, Ill.
July 17, 1857.
J. M. PECK.
PIONEER LETTERS
IX. SENATOR DOUGLAS'S LETTER
(From _Belleville Advocate_, April 10, 1908. Clipping,
I.B.H.C.,--K11)
Springfield, Illinois. Mar. 10, 1857
Rev. James Lemen,
Collinsville, Illinois,
Dear Sir:--In a former letter I wrote you fully as to my views as to
the "Jefferson-Lemen Anti-Slavery Pact," and that there is no doubt
but that the anti-slavery contest of your father, Rev. James Lemen,
Sr., and the organizing of Bethel church as one of the results,
eventually led to our free state constitution. I also thank you again
for the privilege of reading Jefferson's letters to your father, and
other papers in connection with the matter, but desire to add a
thought or two, or more properly expound [expand] some points in my
recent letter.
The anti-slavery pact or agreement between the two men and its far
reaching results comprise one of the most intensely interesting
chapters in our national and state histories. Its profound secrecy and
the splendid loyalty of Jefferson's friends which preserved it, were
alike necessary to the success of the scheme as well as for his future
preferment; for had it been known that Jefferson had sent Lemen as his
special agent on an anti-slavery mission to shape matters in the
territories to his own ends, it would have wrecked his popularity in
the South and rendered Lemen's mission worse than useless.
It has always been a mystery why the pressing demands of Governor
Harrison and his Council for the repeal of the anti-slavery clause in
the Ordinance of 1787 which excluded slavery {p.47} from the
Northwest Territory, could make no headway before a encession [?] of
pro-slavery Congress; but the matter is now clear. The great
Jefferson, through his confidential leaders in Congress [held that
body back, until Mr. Lemen, under his orders], had rallied his friends
and sent in anti-slavery petitions demanding the maintenance of the
clause, when the Senate, where Harrison's demands were then pending,
denied them. So a part of the honor of saving that grand clause which
dedicated the territory to freedom, belongs to your father. Indeed,
considering Jefferson's ardent friendship for him and his admiration
and approval of his early anti-slavery labors in Virginia, which
antedated the Ordinance of 1787 by several years, there is but little
doubt but that your father's labors were a factor of influence which
quickened if it did not suggest to Jefferson the original purpose
which finally resulted in putting the original clause in the
Ordinance.
This matter assumes a phase of personal interest with me, and I find
myself, politically, in the good company of Jefferson and your father.
With them, everything turned on whether the people of the territory
wanted slavery or not. Harrison and his council had informed Congress
that the people desired it; but Jefferson and Lemen doubted it, and
when the latter assisted in sending in great anti-slavery petitions,
Jefferson's friends in Congress granted the people their wish, and
denied Harrison's pro-slavery demands. That is, the voice and wishes
of the people in the territory were heard and respected, and that
appears to me to be the correct doctrine.
Should you or your family approve it, I would suggest that the facts
of the "Jefferson-Lemen Anti-Slavery Pact" be fully written up and
arranged for publication, since they embrace some exceedingly
important state and national history, and, in fact, will necessitate a
new or larger personal history of Jefferson, as these facts will add
another splendid chapter to the great story of his marvellous career.
If you think the publication of Jefferson's letters and suggestions to
your father would rather tend to dwarf the legitimate importance of
his great religious movement in the formation of our early churches,
on account of the wonderful political results of the "anti-slavery
pact" it would be sufficient to command belief everywhere just to
simply state that in his anti-slavery mission and contest he acted
under Jefferson's advice {p.48} and help; because the consequences
were so important and far reaching that it is self-evident he must
have had some great and all-prevailing power behind him.
I was greatly pained to learn of your illness, in your last letter,
but hope this will find you comfortable.
Yours in confidence,
S. A. DOUGLAS.
I wrote this letter in Springfield, but by an over-sight neglected to
mail it there. But if you write me in a fortnight, direct to
Springfield, as I expect to be there then.
Yours Secv. [_sic_] D.
X. ANNOUNCEMENT BY J. B. LEMEN
(From _Belleville Advocate_, April 17, 1908. Clipping,
I.B.H.C.,--K11)
It was our purpose in this letter [communication] to send the Advocate
a copy of one of Abraham Lincoln's letters, and some other matter from
him and Douglas, from the old family notes of Rev. James Lemen never
yet published; but increased illness, and their greater length,
prevented making the copy. In their place, however, we send a copy
each of Governor Edward's and Congressman Snyder's letters. The
prophetic utterances in this letter as to what would fall on Mexico's
treachery and slavery's insolence, were so literally fulfilled that
they emphasized anew Congressman Snyder's wonderful capabilities in
sizing up public questions correctly and reading the coming events of
the future, and prove him to have been a statesman of wonderful
powers. The next, which will be the concluding article in this series,
will contain the copy of Lincoln's letter and the other matter above
referred to.
The typos made one or two slight errors in Senator Douglas's letter in
last week's issue. For "expound" the reader should have read "expand,"
and at another point the letter should read that "Jefferson, through
his confidential leaders in Congress, held that body back until Mr.
Lemen, under his orders, had rallied his friends and sent in
anti-slavery petitions, etc,"
[JOSEPH B. LEMEN.]
XI. {p.49} GOV. NINIAN EDWARDS TO REV. JAMES LEMEN.
(From _Belleville Advocate_, April 17, 1908. Clipping,
I.B.H.C.,--K11)
Vandalia, Ill., Dec. 24, 1826.
Rev. James Lemen,
Collinsville, Illinois,
Dear Sir:--Having great respect for your influence and reposing
perfect confidence in your capable judgment on public affairs, I would
be very much pleased to have you call as soon as you arrive here, as I
desire to have your views and advice on some important matters. It is
my hope, as it will be my pride, that the term upon which I enter
shall be marked with a degree of educational interest and progress not
hitherto attained in our young commonwealth; and I wish to ask for
your counsel and aid in assisting to impress upon the General Assembly
the importance of such subjects, and the necessity of some further and
better legislation on our school matters; and I also wish to consult
with you in regard to the matter of the proposed Illinois and Michigan
Canal.
Sincerely your friend,
NINIAN EDWARDS.
XII. HON. ADAM W. SNYDER TO REV. JAMES LEMEN.
(From _Belleville Advocate_, April 17, 1908. Clipping,
I.B.H.C.,--K11)
City of Washington, Jan. 5, 1838.
Rev. James Lemen,
[Collinsville, Illinois]
My Dear Friend:--To the letter which I wrote you a few days since I
wish to add that the members of the Illinois delegation in Congress
have read the letter you recently wrote me, and they are all willing
and ready to assist in pressing the cause of the class of claimants
whom you mentioned upon the attention of the government for a more
liberal and generous allowance of lands. I have no further news to
communicate, except that I believe Mexico's treachery and insolence
will sooner or later call down upon her a severe chastisement from
this country; and that our Southern friends in Congress are growing
exasperatingly and needlessly sensitive on the slavery question,
claiming that Jefferson's {p.50} views would sustain their positions,
not knowing the splendid secret of your father's (Rev. James Lemen,
Sr.) anti-slavery mission under Jefferson's orders and advice, which
saved Illinois and we might say the Northwest Territory, to freedom.
In fact, the demands of slavery, if not controlled by its friends,
will eventually put the country into a mood that will no longer brook
its insolence and greed.
Yours in esteem and confidence,
A. W. SNYDER.
XIII. ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S LETTER
_Belleville Weekly Advocate_, April 24, 1908
The following letter and remarks from Abraham Lincoln, hitherto
unpublished, comprise the fifth letter of the series of old "Pioneer
Letters" which Mr. J. B. Lemen of O'Fallon is sending to the
Advocate.--Ed.
Springfield, Illinois. March 2, 1857.
Rev. James Lemen,
[O'Fallon, Illinois,]
Friend Lemen: Thanking you for your warm appreciation of my views in a
former letter as to the importance in many features of your collection
of old family notes and papers, I will add a few words more as to
Elijah P. Lovejoy's case. His letters among your old family notes were
of more interest to me than even those of Thomas Jefferson, written to
your father. Of course they [the latter] were exceedingly important as
a part of the history of the "Jefferson-Lemen Anti-Slavery Pact,"
under which your father, Rev. James Lemen, Sr., as Jefferson's
anti-slavery agent in Illinois, founded his anti-slavery churches,
among which was the present Bethel church, which set in motion the
forces which finally made Illinois a free state, all of which was
splendid; but Lovejoy's tragic death for freedom in every sense marked
his sad ending as the most important single event that ever happened
in the new world.
Both your father and Lovejoy were pioneer leaders in the cause of
freedom, and it has always been difficult for me to see why your
father, who was a resolute, uncompromising, and aggressive leader, who
boldly proclaimed his purpose to make both the territory and the state
free, never aroused nor encountered any of that mob violence which
both in St. {p.51} Louis and Alton confronted or pursued Lovejoy, and
which finally doomed him to a felon's death and a martyr's crown.
Perhaps the two cases are a little parallel with those of John and
Peter. John was bold and fearless at the scene of the Crucifixion,
standing near the cross receiving the Savior's request to care for his
mother, but was not annoyed; while Peter, whose disposition to shrink
from public view, seemed to catch the attention of members of the mob
on every hand, until finally to throw public attention off, he denied
his master with an oath; though later the grand old apostle redeemed
himself grandly, and like Lovejoy, died a martyr to his faith. Of
course, there was no similarity between Peter's treachery at the
Temple and Lovejoy's splendid courage when the pitiless mob were
closing around him. But in the cases of the two apostles at the scene
mentioned, John was more prominent or loyal in his presence and
attention to the Great Master than Peter was, but the latter seemed to
catch the attention of the mob; and as Lovejoy, one of the most
inoffensive of men, for merely printing a small paper, devoted to the
freedom of the body and mind of man, was pursued to his death; while
his older comrade in the cause of freedom, Rev. James Lemen, Sr., who
boldly and aggressively proclaimed his purpose to make both the
territory and the state free, was never molested a moment by the
minions of violence. The madness and pitiless determination with which
the mob steadily pursued Lovejoy to his doom, marks it as one of the
most unreasoning and unreasonable in all time, except that which
doomed the Savior to the cross.
If ever you should come to Springfield again, do not fail to call. The
memory of our many "evening sittings" here and elsewhere, as we called
them, suggests many a pleasant hour, both pleasant and helpful.
Truly yours,
A. LINCOLN.
XIV. THE LEMEN MONUMENT AND REV. LEMEN'S PART IN EARLY ILLINOIS
HISTORY
(From _Belleville Advocate_, Tuesday, April 6, 1909. Clipping in
I.B.H.C.,--K11)
The monument to be erected by the Baptist people of Illinois and
others at the grave of Rev. James Lemen, Sr., near Waterloo in Monroe
county, is not only to honor his memory {p.52} as a revolutionary
soldier, territorial leader, Indian fighter, and founder of the
Baptist cause in Illinois, but it is also in remembrance of the fact
that he was the companion and co-worker with Thomas Jefferson in
setting in motion the forces which finally recorded the anti-slavery
clause in the Ordinance of 1787, which dedicated the great Northwest
territory to freedom and later gave Illinois a free state
constitution.
Only recently the Society of the Sons of the Revolution in Chicago,
after a critical examination of James Lemen's military and civil
record, by unanimous vote, appropriated twenty-five dollars for his
monument fund; and we give below a copy of the papers which they used
and which will interest our readers, the first being Gen. Ainsworth's
letter:
WAR DEPARTMENT
Adjutant General's Office
Washington, Feb. 13, 1908.
The records show that James Lemen served as private in Captain George
Wall's Company of the Fourth Virginia Regiment, commanded at various
times by Major Isaac Beall and Colonels James Wood and John Neville in
the Revolutionary war. Term of enlistment, one year from March 3,
1778.
F. C. AINSWORTH, Adjt. Gen.
("In January 1779, James Lemen had his term of enlistment extended for
two years and was transferred to another regiment. After his term
expired he rejoined his old regiment and served through the siege at
Yorktown. He was in several engagements.")
[J. B. L.]
XV. REV. JAMES LEMEN, SR.
(Written by Rev. John M. Peck, in 1857. Published in _Belleville
Advocate_, April 6, 1909. Clipping in I.B.H.C.,--K11)
Rev. James Lemen, Sr., a son of Nicholas Lemen and Christian Lemen,
his wife, was born at the family home near Harper's Ferry, Virginia,
on November 20, 1760. He acquired a practical education and in early
manhood married Miss Katherine Ogle, of Virginia, and they reared a
family. He enlisted for a year as a soldier of the Revolutionary War,
on March 3, 1778, but had his term extended to two years, and {p.53}
was in several engagements. Sometime after his enlistment expired he
rejoined his old comrades and served through the siege at Yorktown.
From childhood, in a singular manner, James Lemen was the special
favorite and idol of Thomas Jefferson, who was a warm friend of his
father's family. Almost before Mr. Lemen had reached manhood,
Jefferson would consult him on all matters, even on great state
affairs, and afterwards stated that Mr. Lemen's advice always proved
to be surprisingly reliable.
Our subject was a born anti-slavery leader, and by his Christian and
friendly arguments he induced scores of masters in Virginia to free
their slaves; this quickly caught Jefferson's attention and he freely
confessed that Mr. Lemen's influence on him had redoubled his dislike
for slavery and, though himself a slaveholder, he most earnestly
denounced the institution. The following paragraphs from a letter he
wrote to James Lemen's brother, Robert, who then lived near Harper's
Ferry, Virginia, on September 10, 1807, will disclose that Mr. Lemen's
influence was largely concerned in connection with Jefferson's share
in the Ordinance of 1787, in its anti-slavery clause. The paragraph is
as follows:--
"If your brother, James Lemen, should visit Virginia soon, as I learn
he possibly may, do not let him return until he makes me a visit. I
will also write him to be sure and see me. [5]Among all my friends who
are near, he is still a little nearer. I discovered his worth when he
was but a child and I freely confess that in some of my most important
achievements his example, wish, and advice, though then but a very
young man, largely influenced my action. This was particularly true as
to whatever share I may have had in the transfer of our great
Northwestern Territory to the United States, and especially for the
fact that I was so well pleased with the anti-slavery clause inserted
later in the Ordinance of 1787. Before any one had ever mentioned the
matter, James Lemen, by reason of his devotion to anti-slavery
principles, suggested to me that we (Virginia) make the transfer and
that slavery be excluded; and it so impressed and influenced me that
whatever is due me as credit for my share in the matter is largely, if
not wholly, due to James Lemen's advice and most righteous counsel.
[18]His record in the new country has fully justified my course in
inducing him {p.54} to settle there with the view of properly shaping
events in the best interest of the people. If he comes to Virginia,
see that he calls on me."
James Lemen did not visit Virginia and President Jefferson did not get
to see him, but his letters to him showed what a great affection he
had for his friend and agent. On May 2, 1778 [1784], at Annapolis,
Md., Thomas Jefferson and James Lemen made their final agreement under
which he was to settle in Illinois to shape matters after Jefferson's
wishes, but always in the people's interest and for freedom, and
particularly, to uphold the anti-slavery policy promised by Jefferson
and later confirmed by the anti-slavery clause in the Ordinance of
1787 which principle both Jefferson and Mr. Lemen expected would
finally be assailed by the pro-slavery power, and the facts confirmed
their judgment. In 1786 Mr. Lemen with his wife and young family
settled finally at New Design, now in Monroe county. [3]He was a judge
under the early Territorial law. He finally united with the Baptist
church and immediately set about collecting the Baptists into
churches, having the first church constituted at his house.
Mr. Lemen created the first eight Baptist churches in Illinois, having
them especially declare against slavery and intemperance. When General
William Henry Harrison became Governor, he and his Territorial Council
went over to pro-slavery influences and demands, and carried Mr.
Lemen's seven churches, which he had then created, with them. For some
months he labored to call them to anti-slavery grounds, but failing,
he declared for a division and created his eighth church, now Bethel
church, near Collinsville, on strictly anti-slavery grounds; and this
event opened the anti-slavery contest in 1809 which finally in 1818
led to the election of an anti-slavery Convention which gave Illinois
a free state constitution. [32]Jefferson warmly approved Mr. Lemen's
movement and sent his new church twenty dollars, which, with a fund
the members collected and gave, was finally transferred to the church
treasury without disclosing Jefferson's identity. This was done in
order not to disturb his friendly relations with the extreme South.
But Jefferson made no secret of his antipathy for slavery, though
unwilling that the fact should be known that he sent James Lemen to
the new country especially to defend it against slavery, as he knew it
would arouse the {p.55} resentment of the extreme pro-slavery element
against both him and his agent and probably defeat their movement.
[24]James Lemen also first suggested the plan to extend the boundary
of Illinois northward to give more territory and better shape, and had
a government surveyor make a map showing the great advantages and gave
them to Nathaniel Pope, our territorial delegate, asking him to
present the matter, which he did, and Congress adopted the plan. The
extension gave the additional territory for fourteen counties and
Chicago is included.
James Lemen was a noted Indian fighter in Illinois, ever ready with
his trusty rifle to defend the homes of the early settlers against the
savage foe, and in every way he fully justified Jefferson's judgment
in sending him to look after the best interests of the people in the
new territory.
Mr. Lemen possessed every moral and mental attribute in a high degree,
and if any one was more marked than another it was his incomparable
instinct against oppression, which his wonderful anti-slavery record
accentuated as his chief endowment, though in all respects he was well
equipped for a leader among men. That instinct, it might be said,
fixed his destiny. At Jefferson's request he settled in the new
territory to finally oppose slavery. That was before the Ordinance of
1787 with its anti-slavery clause, but Mr. Lemen had Jefferson's
assurance beforehand that the territory should be dedicated to
freedom; though they both believed the pro-slavery power would finally
press for its demands before stated, and the facts proved they were
right. The reasons which necessitated the secrecy of the
Jefferson-Lemen anti-slavery pact of May 2, 1784, under which Mr.
Lemen came to Illinois on his anti-slavery mission at Jefferson's
wish, and which was absolutely necessary to its success at first, no
longer exists; and the fear of James Lemen's sons that its publication
would so overshadow his great church work in Illinois with Jefferson's
wonderful personality, as to dwarf his merits, is largely groundless.
Senator Douglas, who with others is familiar with all the facts, says
that when the matter is fully published and well known, it will give
to both Mr. Lemen and Jefferson their proper shares of credit and
fame; and, while it will add a new star to Jefferson's splendid fame,
it will carry James Lemen along with him as his worthy co-worker and
companion. The {p.56} subject of our sketch died at his home near
Waterloo, Monroe county, on January 8th, 1823, and was buried in the
family cemetery near by.
XVI. OLD LEMEN FAMILY NOTES, JAMES LEMEN HISTORY, AND SOME RELATED
FACTS
(MS. Document in I.B.H.C.,--C102. By Jos. B. Lemen)
In 1857, to save the old "Lemen Family Notes" from loss by careless
but persistent borrowers, Dr. B. F. Edwards, of St. Louis, and Rev. J.
M. Peck, advised Rev. James Lemen, Jr., to make copies of all and then
give the original stock to a friend whom they named to keep as his own
in a safe vault in St. Louis, if he would pay all storage charges. But
at that time he only gave the most important ones to Rev. J. M. Peck
to place temporarily in a safe in St. Louis where he sometimes kept
his own papers; though some years later he acted on their advice and
making copies of all papers and letters of any value, gave the whole
original stock to the party mentioned (we do not recall his name, but
it is among our papers) [possibly the J. M. Smith mentioned in Dr.
Peck's communication to James Lemen, Jr., July 17, 1857] and he placed
them in the safe. Shortly after this their holder died, and they
passed into the hands of others who removed them to another safe
somewhere in St. Louis; but having no further title in the papers, and
having copies of all for use, the family finally lost all traces of
the papers and the parties holding them, and have only heard from them
two or three times in more than 40 years.
A few years ago, when a history of Rev. James Lemen, Jr., and his
father, Rev. James Lemen, Sr., was in contemplation, a reputed agent
of the parties whom he then claimed held the old family notes,
informed us that the family could have them at any time they wished;
and we promised some of our friends who wished to see them that after
we had used them in connection with the proposed history, the old
stock of papers would be placed where they could see and copy them, if
they wished. It was intended to have a few of the more important
letters photographed for the James Lemen history; though it was said
that some years before some one had a few of them photographed and
they were so indistinct as to be worthless; but we hoped for better
results. But it {p.57} finally developed that the reputed agent would
expect us to pay him (contrary to our first impressions) quite a round
sum of money for the restoration and use of the papers before he would
deliver them to us. This awakened suspicions as to his reliability and
a detective, to whom we sent his name and number for investigation,
informed us that no such man could be found; and undoubtedly he was
some dishonest person seeking to obtain money under false pretenses.
And so the family, as for many years past, now knows nothing as to the
parties who hold the papers or where they are. A singular fatality
seems to have awaited all the papers placed at Dr. Peck's disposal or
advice. His own papers were generally destroyed or lost, and the old
"Lemen Family Notes" placed some years after his death, partly as he
had advised, cannot be found. But while Dr. Peck's lost papers are a
distinct and irreparable loss, no loss is sustained in the
misplacement of the old Lemen notes, as every line or fact of any
value in them was copied and the copies are all preserved; and nearly
all the more important ones have been published, except a very few,
including Rev. James Lemen's interviews with Lincoln, as written up by
Mr. Lemen on ten pages of legal cap paper, and that paper will
probably be published soon, if it is not held specially for the James
Lemen history.
As to that history, it will be delayed for some time, as the writer,
who was expected to see to its preparation, was named by the State
Baptist Convention as a member of the Baptist State Committee to
assist with the James Lemen monument; and much of the matter intended
for the history was published in connection with the labors of the
State Committee. One object of the history was to secure or to
influence that degree of recognition of the importance of the services
of Rev. James Lemen, Sr. and his sons, with a few co-workers of the
latter, in the early history and interests of both the Baptist cause
and the State, on the part of the Baptists, to which the family
thought them entitled. But since the Baptists, the "Sons of the
Revolution," and others have placed a monument at the grave of the old
State leader and Baptist pioneer, the Rev. James Lemen, Sr., it is
felt that the object for making the history has already been in part
realized. Another circumstance which has delayed it, is the poor
health of the writer; so the prospect is that the making of the
history will be delayed for some time.
This {p.58} is written entirely from memory, as the papers and dates
to which we refer are not before me, but we will retain a copy and if
there proves to be any errors in this one, we will have them
corrected. There was such a demand for them that some of Dr. Peck's,
Lovejoy's, Douglas's, Lincoln's and some other letters were published,
and some of them are included in the papers we send.
Some years ago some one claimed that the old family notes had been
found, which led to statements in the papers that they would soon be
placed where people could see and read them; but it proved to be a
mistake. For the loss of the papers the family do not believe there
was any fault with the parties originally holding them, as in fact
they had the right to hold them where they pleased, according to the
agreement; but that from sudden deaths and other circumstances, they
were misplaced.
It should be added that every paper of any value, which was given to
the St. Louis parties to hold was copied and the copies preserved,
except mere personal, friendship letters, and of these there was quite
a large stock; also that much of Dr. Peck's writings and many letters
of his and others were loaned out and could not be given to the St.
Louis parties to keep, but all of any real value have been copied or
published, except the Lemen-Lincoln interviews and some others, and
that even some of these copies are loaned out, among them copies of
letters from Dr. Peck, Douglas, Lincoln, Lovejoy, if I recall
correctly, and others; though the facts or information in them have
already been published, except such facts as will be held for the
James Lemen history, and we have copies of them, so nothing will be
lost.
(Signed) JOSEPH B. LEMEN.
O'Fallon, Illinois,
January 10, 1911.
[N. B. The above communication accompanied the gift of the walnut
chest made by the elder James Lemen at Ft. Piggott, which was sent to
the custodian of the Baptist Historical Collection at Shurtleff
College, early in the year 1913--COMPILER.]
REFERENCES {p.59}
1. See p. 26.
2. Reynolds "My Own Times" and "Pioneer History of Illinois."
3. See "Territorial Records of Illinois" (Illinois State Historical
Library, _Publication_, III.), and compare p. 54 _post_.
4. See Biographical sketches in "Lemen Family History."
5. See pp. 33, 53.
6. See pp. 27, 28.
7. See pp. 23, 42, 56.
8. Peck, J. M., "Annals of the West," _in loco_.
9. See p. 54 _post_, and Hinsdale, "Old Northwest."
10. Alvord, "Cahokia Records," Introduction.
11. Reynolds, "My Own Times," p. 208.
12. McMaster, "People of United States," II: 30, 31; III: 108; St.
Clair Papers.
13. Blake, "History of Slavery," p. 431.
14. See p. 29.
15. See p. 30, and compare No. 16 below.
16. Blake, "History of Slavery," _in loco_.
17. See pp. 35, 36, 43.
18. See p. 53.
19. See p. 30.
20. See p. 30, and compare, Patterson, "Early Illinois," Fergus
Historical Coll., No. 14, pp. 141-2.
21. See pp. 30, 35.
22. Reynolds, "My Own Times," p. 170.
23. See p. 36.
24. See p. 55, and compare reference No. 19.
25. See p. 37.
26. See "Centennial History of Madison Co.," I: 52-55.
27. See p. 38.
28. See p. 47.
29. See p. 50.
30. See p. 34.
31. See p. 41.
32. See p. 54.
33. _Cf._ Smith, J. A., "History of the Baptists," p. 40; Benedict,
"History of the Baptists," II: 246-8.
34. See p. 39.
35. See pp. 42, 56 and Peck, J. M., "Father Clark," _in loco_.
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