1 files changed, 311 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/57259-0.txt b/57259-0.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3b02a83
--- /dev/null
+++ b/57259-0.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,311 @@
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 57259 ***
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+A COLORED MAN'S REMINISCENCES
+
+OF JAMES MADISON.
+
+BY PAUL JENNINGS.
+
+BROOKLYN:
+
+GEORGE C. BEADLE.
+
+1865.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+Among the laborers at the Department of the Interior is an intelligent
+colored man, Paul Jennings, who was born a slave on President Madison's
+estate, in Montpelier, Va., in 1799. His reputed father was Benj.
+Jennings, an English trader there; his mother, a slave of Mr. Madison,
+and the granddaughter of an Indian. Paul was a "body servant" of Mr.
+Madison, till his death, and afterwards of Daniel Webster, having
+purchased his freedom of Mrs. Madison. His character for sobriety,
+truth, and fidelity, is unquestioned; and as he was a daily witness of
+interesting events, I have thought some of his recollections were worth
+writing down in almost his own language.
+
+On the 10th of January, 1865, at a curious sale of books, coins and
+autographs belonging to Edward M. Thomas, a colored man, for many years
+Messenger to the House of Representatives, was sold, among other curious
+lots, an autograph of Daniel Webster, containing these words: "I have
+paid $120 for the freedom of Paul Jennings; he agrees to work out the
+same at $8 per month, to be furnished with board, clothes, washing," &c.
+
+J. B. R.
+
+[Illustration: (Handwritten text)
+
+Mar: 19. 1847.--
+
+I have paid $120 for the Freedom of Paul Jennings--He agrees to work out
+the term, at 8 dollars a month, to be furnished with board, clothes, &
+washing--to begin when we return from the Leritte--His freedom papers I
+gave to him; they are recorded in this District.
+
+Dan Webster
+Washington.]
+
+
+
+
+REMINISCENCES OF MADISON.
+
+
+About ten years before Mr. Madison was President, he and Colonel Monroe
+were rival candidates for the Legislature. Mr. Madison was anxious to be
+elected, and sent his chariot to bring up a Scotchman to the polls, who
+lived in the neighborhood. But when brought up, he cried out: "Put me
+down for Colonel Monroe, for he was the first man that took me by the
+hand in this country." Colonel Monroe was elected, and his friends joked
+Mr. Madison pretty hard about his Scotch friend, and I have heard Mr.
+Madison and Colonel Monroe have many a hearty laugh over the subject,
+for years after.
+
+When Mr. Madison was chosen President, we came on and moved into the
+White House; the east room was not finished, and Pennsylvania Avenue
+was not paved, but was always in an awful condition from either mud or
+dust. The city was a dreary place.
+
+Mr. Robert Smith was then Secretary of State, but as he and Mr. Madison
+could not agree, he was removed, and Colonel Monroe appointed to his
+place. Dr. Eustis was Secretary of War--rather a rough, blustering man;
+Mr. Gallatin, a tip-top man, was Secretary of the Treasury; and Mr.
+Hamilton, of South Carolina, a pleasant gentleman, who thought Mr.
+Madison could do nothing wrong, and who always concurred in every thing
+he said, was Secretary of the Navy.
+
+Before the war of 1812 was declared, there were frequent consultations
+at the White House as to the expediency of doing it. Colonel Monroe was
+always fierce for it, so were Messrs. Lowndes, Giles, Poydrass, and
+Pope--all Southerners; all his Secretaries were likewise in favor of it.
+
+Soon after war was declared, Mr. Madison made his regular summer visit
+to his farm in Virginia. We had not been there long before an express
+reached us one evening, informing Mr. M. of Gen. Hull's surrender. He
+was astounded at the news, and started back to Washington the next
+morning.
+
+After the war had been going on for a couple of years, the people of
+Washington began to be alarmed for the safety of the city, as the
+British held Chesapeake Bay with a powerful fleet and army. Every thing
+seemed to be left to General Armstrong, then Secretary of war, who
+ridiculed the idea that there was any danger. But, in August, 1814, the
+enemy had got so near, there could be no doubt of their intentions.
+Great alarm existed, and some feeble preparations for defence were made.
+Com. Barney's flotilla was stripped of men, who were placed in battery,
+at Bladensburg, where they fought splendidly. A large part of his men
+were tall, strapping negroes, mixed with white sailors and marines. Mr.
+Madison reviewed them just before the fight, and asked Com. Barney if
+his "negroes would not run on the approach of the British?" "No sir,"
+said Barney, "they don't know how to run; they will die by their guns
+first." They fought till a large part of them were killed or wounded;
+and Barney himself wounded and taken prisoner. One or two of these
+negroes are still living here.
+
+Well, on the 24th of August, sure enough, the British reached
+Bladensburg, and the fight began between 11 and 12. Even that very
+morning General Armstrong assured Mrs. Madison there was no danger. The
+President, with General Armstrong, General Winder, Colonel Monroe,
+Richard Rush, Mr. Graham, Tench Ringgold, and Mr. Duvall, rode out on
+horseback to Bladensburg to see how things looked. Mrs. Madison ordered
+dinner to be ready at 3, as usual; I set the table myself, and brought
+up the ale, cider, and wine, and placed them in the coolers, as all the
+Cabinet and several military gentlemen and strangers were expected.
+While waiting, at just about 3, as Sukey, the house-servant, was lolling
+out of a chamber window, James Smith, a free colored man who had
+accompanied Mr. Madison to Bladensburg, gallopped up to the house,
+waving his hat, and cried out, "Clear out, clear out! General Armstrong
+has ordered a retreat!" All then was confusion. Mrs. Madison ordered her
+carriage, and passing through the dining-room, caught up what silver she
+could crowd into her old-fashioned reticule, and then jumped into the
+chariot with her servant girl Sukey, and Daniel Carroll, who took charge
+of them; Jo. Bolin drove them over to Georgetown Heights; the British
+were expected in a few minutes. Mr. Cutts, her brother-in-law, sent me
+to a stable on 14th street, for his carriage. People were running in
+every direction. John Freeman (the colored butler) drove off in the
+coachee with his wife, child, and servant; also a feather bed lashed on
+behind the coachee, which was all the furniture saved, except part of
+the silver and the portrait of Washington (of which I will tell you
+by-and-by).
+
+I will here mention that although the British were expected every
+minute, they did not arrive for some hours; in the mean time, a rabble,
+taking advantage of the confusion, ran all over the White House, and
+stole lots of silver and whatever they could lay their hands on.
+
+About sundown I walked over to the Georgetown ferry, and found the
+President and all hands (the gentlemen named before, who acted as a sort
+of body-guard for him) waiting for the boat. It soon returned, and we
+all crossed over, and passed up the road about a mile; they then left us
+servants to wander about. In a short time several wagons from
+Bladensburg, drawn by Barney's artillery horses, passed up the road,
+having crossed the Long Bridge before it was set on fire. As we were
+cutting up some pranks a white wagoner ordered us away, and told his boy
+Tommy to reach out his gun, and he would shoot us. I told him "he had
+better have used it at Bladensburg." Just then we came up with Mr.
+Madison and his friends, who had been wandering about for some hours,
+consulting what to do. I walked on to a Methodist minister's, and in the
+evening, while he was at prayer, I heard a tremendous explosion, and,
+rushing out, saw that the public buildings, navy yard, ropewalks, &c.,
+were on fire.
+
+Mrs. Madison slept that night at Mrs. Love's, two or three miles over
+the river. After leaving that place she called in at a house, and went
+up stairs. The lady of the house learning who she was, became furious,
+and went to the stairs and screamed out, "Miss Madison! if that's you,
+come down and go out! Your husband has got mine out fighting, and d--
+you, you shan't stay in my house; so get out!" Mrs. Madison complied,
+and went to Mrs. Minor's, a few miles further, where she stayed a day or
+two, and then returned to Washington, where she found Mr. Madison at her
+brother-in-law's, Richard Cutts, on F street. All the facts about Mrs.
+M. I learned from her servant Sukey. We moved into the house of Colonel
+John B. Taylor, corner of 18th street and New York Avenue, where we
+lived till the news of peace arrived.
+
+In two or three weeks after we returned, Congress met in extra session,
+at Blodgett's old shell of a house on 7th street (where the General
+Post-office now stands). It was three stories high, and had been used
+for a theatre, a tavern, an Irish boarding house, &c.; but both Houses
+of Congress managed to get along in it very well, notwithstanding it had
+to accommodate the Patent-office, City and General Post-office,
+committee-rooms, and what was left of the Congressional Library, at the
+same time. Things are very different now.
+
+The next summer, Mr. John Law, a large property-holder about the
+Capitol, fearing it would not be rebuilt, got up a subscription and
+built a large brick building (now called the Old Capitol, where the
+secesh prisoners are confined), and offered it to Congress for their
+use, till the Capitol could be rebuilt. This coaxed them back, though
+strong efforts were made to remove the seat of government north; but the
+southern members kept it here.
+
+It has often been stated in print, that when Mrs. Madison escaped from
+the White House, she cut out from the frame the large portrait of
+Washington (now in one of the parlors there), and carried it off. This
+is totally false. She had no time for doing it. It would have required a
+ladder to get it down. All she carried off was the silver in her
+reticule, as the British were thought to be but a few squares off, and
+were expected every moment. John Susé (a Frenchman, then door-keeper,
+and still living) and Magraw, the President's gardener, took it down and
+sent it off on a wagon, with some large silver urns and such other
+valuables as could be hastily got hold of. When the British did arrive,
+they ate up the very dinner, and drank the wines, &c., that I had
+prepared for the President's party.
+
+When the news of peace arrived, we were crazy with joy. Miss Sally
+Coles, a cousin of Mrs. Madison, and afterwards wife of Andrew
+Stevenson, since minister to England, came to the head of the stairs,
+crying out, "Peace! peace!" and told John Freeman (the butler) to serve
+out wine liberally to the servants and others. I played the President's
+March on the violin, John Susé and some others were drunk for two days,
+and such another joyful time was never seen in Washington. Mr. Madison
+and all his Cabinet were as pleased as any, but did not show their joy
+in this manner.
+
+Mrs. Madison was a remarkably fine woman. She was beloved by every body
+in Washington, white and colored. Whenever soldiers marched by, during
+the war, she always sent out and invited them in to take wine and
+refreshments, giving them liberally of the best in the house. Madeira
+wine was better in those days than now, and more freely drank. In the
+last days of her life, before Congress purchased her husband's papers,
+she was in a state of absolute poverty, and I think sometimes suffered
+for the necessaries of life. While I was a servant to Mr. Webster, he
+often sent me to her with a market-basket full of provisions, and told
+me whenever I saw anything in the house that I thought she was in need
+of, to take it to her. I often did this, and occasionally gave her
+small sums from my own pocket, though I had years before bought my
+freedom of her.
+
+Mr. Madison, I think, was one of the best men that ever lived. I never
+saw him in a passion, and never knew him to strike a slave, although he
+had over one hundred; neither would he allow an overseer to do it.
+Whenever any slaves were reported to him as stealing or "cutting up"
+badly, he would send for them and admonish them privately, and never
+mortify them by doing it before others. They generally served him very
+faithfully. He was temperate in his habits. I don't think he drank a
+quart of brandy in his whole life. He ate light breakfasts and no
+suppers, but rather a hearty dinner, with which he took invariably but
+one glass of wine. When he had hard drinkers at his table, who had put
+away his choice Madeira pretty freely, in response to their numerous
+toasts, he would just touch the glass to his lips, or dilute it with
+water, as they pushed about the decanters. For the last fifteen years
+of his life he drank no wine at all.
+
+After he retired from the presidency, he amused himself chiefly on his
+farm. At the election for members of the Virginia Legislature, in 1829
+or '30, just after General Jackson's accession, he voted for James
+Barbour, who had been a strong Adams man. He also presided, I think,
+over the Convention for amending the Constitution, in 1832.
+
+After the news of peace, and of General Jackson's victory at New
+Orleans, which reached here about the same time, there were great
+illuminations. We moved into the Seven Buildings, corner of 19th-street
+and Pennsylvania Avenue, and while there, General Jackson came on with
+his wife, to whom numerous dinner-parties and levees were given. Mr.
+Madison also held levees every Wednesday evening, at which wine, punch,
+coffee, ice-cream, &c., were liberally served, unlike the present
+custom.
+
+While Mr. Jefferson was President, he and Mr. Madison (then his
+Secretary of State) were extremely intimate; in fact, two brothers could
+not have been more so. Mr. Jefferson always stopped over night at Mr.
+Madison's, in going and returning from Washington.
+
+I have heard Mr. Madison say, that when he went to school, he cut his
+own wood for exercise. He often did it also when at his farm in
+Virginia. He was very neat, but never extravagant, in his clothes. He
+always dressed wholly in black--coat, breeches, and silk stockings, with
+buckles in his shoes and breeches. He never had but one suit at a time.
+He had some poor relatives that he had to help, and wished to set them
+an example of economy in the matter of dress. He was very fond of
+horses, and an excellent judge of them, and no jockey ever cheated him.
+He never had less than seven horses in his Washington stables while
+President.
+
+He often told the story, that one day riding home from court with old
+Tom Barbour (father of Governor Barbour), they met a colored man, who
+took off his hat. Mr. M. raised his, to the surprise of old Tom; to whom
+Mr. M. replied, "I never allow a negro to excel me in politeness."
+Though a similar story is told of General Washington, I have often heard
+this, as above, from Mr. Madison's own lips.
+
+After Mr. Madison retired from the presidency, in 1817, he invariably
+made a visit twice a year to Mr. Jefferson--sometimes stopping two or
+three weeks--till Mr. Jefferson's death, in 1826.
+
+I was always with Mr. Madison till he died, and shaved him every other
+day for sixteen years. For six months before his death, he was unable to
+walk, and spent most of his time reclined on a couch; but his mind was
+bright, and with his numerous visitors he talked with as much animation
+and strength of voice as I ever heard him in his best days. I was
+present when he died. That morning Sukey brought him his breakfast, as
+usual. He could not swallow. His niece, Mrs. Willis, said, "What is the
+matter, Uncle Jeames?" "Nothing more than a change of _mind_, my dear."
+His head instantly dropped, and he ceased breathing as quietly as the
+snuff of a candle goes out. He was about eighty-four years old, and was
+followed to the grave by an immense procession of white and colored
+people. The pall-bearers were Governor Barbour, Philip P. Barbour,
+Charles P. Howard, and Reuben Conway; the two last were neighboring
+farmers.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Colored Man's Reminiscences of James
+Madison, by Paul Jennings
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 57259 ***