Read Ebook: The Mentor: The Cradle of Liberty Vol. 6 Num. 10 Serial No. 158 July 1 1918 by Hart Albert Bushnell

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THE MENTOR 1918.07.01, No. 158, The Cradle of Liberty

LEARN ONE THING EVERY DAY

JULY 1 1918 SERIAL NO. 158

THE MENTOR

THE CRADLE OF LIBERTY

DEPARTMENT OF VOLUME 6 HISTORY NUMBER 10

TWENTY CENTS A COPY

LIBERTY

Liberty is older than Law, older than Government, older than the State. Liberty goes back to the Garden of Eden, where first was taught the bitter lesson that where Liberty is uncontrolled, society breaks down. The word is a splendid one, coined by the Romans, "With a great price obtained I this freedom," said the Roman centurion; "But I was free born," replied St. Paul. Liberty was in the hearts of the English colonists; Liberty rang out from the Bell of Independence Hall; Liberty is stamped upon our state and federal constitutions. For Liberty millions of men have struggled and died. Toward Liberty oppressed myriads are stretching out their hands today. Liberty is the pole-star of peoples, the hope of mankind.

ONE

"In old Faneuil, that guild temple of traders and aldermen, butchers and clerks, hucksters and civic magistrates, the spirit of the people conceived an embryonic nation."

Among early Bostonians who owned argosies and had a prosperous trade with France and England was a young bachelor named Peter Faneuil, who, like Paul Revere, was descended from Huguenot refugees. He was the heir of his uncle, Andrew Faneuil, who died in 1738 and left a large fortune. Fond of good living and hospitable, "Here's to Peter Faneuil!" was the toast often proposed above brimming bumpers. From Madeira he ordered amber wine, from London, chariots and sets of crested harness, and fine stuffs, buttons and laces. His ships carried cargoes of tobacco, black walnut, fish, stoves and general merchandise. At forty years of age he was a prince among Colonial merchants. He had, moreover, pride in Boston's advancement, and offered "at his own cost and charge" to build a market for "the use, benefit and advantage of the town." Later, the donor of the market house instructed his architect, the renowned John Smibert, to add a hall above the space given over to provisioners' stalls. In 1742 the two-story brick building was completed. When Peter Faneuil received the formal thanks of Boston, he made the prophetic response, "I hope what I have done will be for the service of the whole country." A year later he died, and was buried in the Granary Burying Ground.

The chamber over the market became the seat of public offices, and, as the Town Hall, was in demand for patriotic celebrations, debates and banquets. In 1761, all of the structure except the walls was destroyed by fire. As no benevolent townsman offered to duplicate Faneuil's gift, the selectmen were empowered to raise the necessary funds for rebuilding by holding a lottery. "Faneuil Hall Lottery Tickets" bore the signature of John Hancock, then a young politician of promise. In 1763 the reconstructed Town Hall was ready for occupancy. It was this rebuilt meeting-place that became the forum of free speech in Boston, the Altar of Liberty from which rose the flame that "roused a depressed people from want and degradation. Here those maxims of political truth which have extended an influence over the habitable globe, and have given rise to new republics, were first promulgated."

The Stamp Act was denounced within its arched and pillared walls, and the repeal celebrated with festivities. Revenue laws were discussed, and when troops were ordered to the provincial capital, a convention in session here raised a fearless voice in defence of Colonial independence. The day following the massacre of the fifth of March, 1770, a mass meeting was called in the Hall, but so many citizens responded that it was necessary to repair to Old South Church, where there was more room. Early in November, 1773, John Hancock presided over a Town Hall meeting, the object of which was to protest against threatened importations of tea by the East India Company of London. At numerous conclaves the tea question continued to agitate the grave townsfolk, until on December sixteenth a group of patriots in the disguise of Indians summarily put an end to discussion by dumping the cargoes of the newly-arrived tea ships into Boston harbor.

Faneuil Hall echoed to vigorous protests against the Port Bill, which so vitally affected Boston commerce, and from the same "Old Faneuil" printed letters were dispatched to the other colonies for the purpose of presenting facts and securing co?peration against proposed aggressions by the mother country. At Faneuil Hall representatives of General Gage assembled one tragic day to receive the arms of the Bostonians. In joyous contrast were the meetings held in the honored edifice after the evacuation of the city by British troops.

In the year 1806 the sturdy building was remodeled and enlarged. During the naval war with England, citizens again held meetings in the Town Hall to inveigh against renewed violations of their "national rights and sovereignty." In the "Cradle of Liberty" Charles Francis Adams, Daniel Webster, Wendell Phillips, Edward Everett, Rufus Choate and Charles Sumner championed justice and democracy. In 1834, at a memorial meeting for Lafayette held in Faneuil, Edward Everett delivered one of his most glowing and eloquent orations, in which he extolled the departed French patriot as the "Lover of Liberty." Referring to the Hall in which he spoke, he said, "The spirit of the departed is in high communion with the spirit of this place."

TWO

Though Paul Revere performed bravely and well numerous patriotic duties assigned to him, most early historians of the Revolution forgot even to mention his name in recounting the crucial events of April, 1775. He lives in our memory today chiefly because one valorous deed of his, in that month of valorous deeds, was made the subject of a popular poem. Nearly ninety years after the Ride, Longfellow rescued the Midnight Messenger from oblivion, and gave him a place among Revolutionary heroes.

Apollos Rivoire, father of Paul, was a native of the Island of Guernsey, and came of Huguenot stock. A fugitive in search of freedom, he found a home in Boston, where on January 1, 1735 , the son was born who was to establish in the annals of his country the Anglicized name of liberty-loving French ancestors. Father and son were metal craftsmen and wrought fine tableware, many examples of which are still in existence. Paul was a skilful designer, and a cartoonist of wit and imagination. But of far greater importance to his associates, he was an up-and-ready sort of person, keen for any task that gave vent to an ardent nature--always in the thick of everything. He was a moving spirit in various secret organizations, had an active part in the Tea Party, and because he was bold and dependable was chosen to carry the news of Boston's successful exploit to sympathizers in New York, and speed it on to Philadelphia. Following a ride of Revere's in December, 1774, to Durham and Portsmouth, the provincials secured powder and ammunition from Fort William and Mary that actually saved the day at the Battle of Bunker Hill.

Early in 1775 Revere engaged with other patriots to patrol the Boston streets and keep advised as to the movements of the redcoats. On April 15th they reported the British camp unwontedly astir. The next day, Sunday, Revere took a message from Dr. Warren to Lexington, where Hancock and Adams, on whose heads a price had been set by the king, were lodging. Upon receiving the messenger's news of British activities the adjourned Provincial Congress re-assembled in Concord and began immediate preparation against attack on the colony's stores. Here let us read the account of "the express" himself, an account at variance with the familiar rhymed version, especially in respect to the lantern signals, and his arrival at the journey's end.

Revere was in constant danger of being overtaken by the entire force, which had embarked at Boston almost at the moment he was reaching the Charlestown shore. Riding at top speed he reached Medford. "I awaked the captain of the Minute Men; and after that I alarmed almost every house, till I got to Lexington. I found Messrs. Hancock and Adams at the Rev. Mr. Clarke's; I told them my errand, and inquired for Mr. Dawes."

When the latter arrived, the two set out for Concord, six miles distant. On the road they were overtaken by a young Dr. Prescott, and all three proceeded to wake the sleeping households along the highway. Suddenly, Revere, riding ahead, was surrounded by four armed redcoats. With William Dawes he was forced into a pasture and detained, while Dr. Prescott, "jumped his horse over a low stone wall, and got to Concord." Revere was led back toward Lexington, but at the sound of guns his captors seized his mount and let him continue alone on foot. In Lexington he saved important papers of Hancock's, and witnessed the first exchange of shots between the provincials and the British.

"Old North Church," Boston, still stands on the original ground where it was erected in 1723. From "the highest window in the wall" the sexton hung the warning lights. The face of the tower bears a tablet to the memory of the dauntless and resourceful Messenger of Liberty.

"Through the gloom and the light The Fate of a nation was riding that night; And the spark struck out by that steed, in his flight Kindled the land into flame with its heat."

THREE

Though British officers were ignorant of the means by which Gage was to assail American freedom, the provincials already knew, and were prepared. The lanterns in North Church tower had signaled their message to watchers in Charlestown, and Revere and Dawes were already on their separate ways, when eight hundred grenadiers and light infantrymen landed at East Cambridge and crossed the marshland to the road that led to Lexington and Concord. At dawn the Minute Men were alive to the warning given by bells and drums that the enemy was approaching; three score or more answered the call to arms on Lexington Green--"a little band of farmers on their own training-field, facing the veteran ranks of the king.... Their homes, their property, personal and communal, and their rights as freemen were threatened; they were patriots and heroes, everyone."

Commanded with threats and oaths to lay down his arms, Captain Parker of the militia cried to his men: "Don't fire unless you are fired on; but if they want a war, let it begin here." In the ensuing assault several militiamen fell, wounded to the death. The blood they spilled baptized the cause of Freedom in a new land. Resolved to die rather than submit, their martyrdom fixed the resolution of all their brothers in the Colonies.

Here, three-quarters of a century later, in "the birthplace of American liberty," Louis Kossuth, the Hungarian patriot, eulogized "the embattled farmers" of immortal memory in these eloquent phrases: "It is their sacrificed blood in which is written the preface of your nation's history. Their death was and ever will be the first bloody revelation of America's destiny, and Lexington the opening scene of a revolution destined to change the character of human governments, and the condition of the human race."

A youth who fought the king's men that wonderful day described how they pushed the British back from Concord Bridge, back through Lincoln, Arlington, Cambridge and Somerville to the Charles. "What could be more pleasing to ambition," he wrote, "than to knock off the shackles of despotism? Freedom was the hobby I mounted, sword in hand, neck or nothing, life or death. I will be one to support my country's rights and gain its independence!"

"What was the matter, and what did you mean in going to the fight?" one of a later generation asked a veteran of Concord. "Young man," was the reply, "what we meant in fighting was this: We always had been free, and we meant to be free always."

The Declaration of Independence is here reproduced in miniature--not for reading purposes; that would be too severe a tax on the eyesight--but simply to show the form and style of the historic Document. The original of this Document is preserved in the Department of State, Washington, carefully protected against light and air.

As may be seen, the Declaration bears the date July 4, 1776, and this is accepted as the Birthday of Independence. On July 3rd and 4th the Declaration was debated and the convention voted in favor of it, and authorized the presiding officer, John Hancock, and the secretary, Charles Thomson, to sign the Document. There was no single hour during which all signed. It was a matter of weeks. All came to it finally, for, as Benjamin Franklin shrewdly observed, "We must all hang together, or else we shall all hang separately."

FIVE

The Philadelphians, having outgrown the primitive "Towne House" that had served the community's needs since 1709, undertook in 1729 to erect an Assembly building commensurate with the growing importance of the province. A dozen years later the new State House was completed, including the dignified chamber now famous as the Hall in which the Declaration of Independence was discussed and received its first signatures. Another decade passed before sufficient funds were available for the rearing of a frame steeple on the south side of the building, "with a suitable place thereon for hanging a bell." To grace this steeple and call together the Provincial Fathers, whose meeting-place was in one of the rooms below, it was decided after prolonged discussion that a bell be ordered from England. A letter dated November 1, 1751, was forthwith dispatched from the Superintendents of the State House to the Colonial agent in London, asking that he purchase "a good bell, of about two thousand pounds weight, the cost of which we may presume may amount to about one hundred pounds sterling, or, perhaps, with the charges, something more.... Let the bell be cast by the best workmen, and examined carefully before it is shipped, with the following words well shaped in large letters around it, viz:

And underneath,

Within a year a ship bearing the new bell was reported at the water-front, and eager citizens thronged the pier hoping to see it. The arrival of the State House bell, destined none knew to what great mission, was the chief interest of that August day in Quaker Philadelphia. To the chagrin of the Superintendents they were compelled to announce a few days later that the long-looked-for bell had "cracked by a stroke of the clapper without any other violence, as it was hung up to try the sound." Two "ingenious workmen" essayed to recast the metal, to which a larger proportion of copper had been added, and in April, 1753, artisans raised the "American bell" to its place in the steeple. Later on it was cast again, because the metal composition was now thought to contain too much copper. The result, we are told, was but tolerably successful. However, this "new great bell" continued in service for over sixty years. It announced the convening of the Assembly and the courts, and for a time was used to summon church-goers on Sunday.

The voice of the bell joined in joyful celebration with that of the people when the odious Stamp Act was repealed; late in the year 1773 it witnessed the agitated remonstrances of the inhabitants against the proposed importations of taxed tea. On September 5, 1774, the First Continental Congress convened in Carpenter's Hall, Philadelphia. It convened again the following May in the State House, and paved the way to the Declaration of Independence. When the Battle of Lexington was reported on an April day, the State House bell summoned to the historic enclosure called the "Yard" a company of eight thousand people, determined to defend "with arms their lives, liberty and property, against all attempts to deprive them of them."

Matters were hurrying to the breaking-point when in June, 1776, the State Assembly received the resolutions of the General Convention of Virginia, which forecast in sentiment and wording the final Declaration. Two days later the National Assembly, also in session at the State House, took the first step toward the Colonies' Magna Charta when the resolution was read and seconded "That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent states." A committee on the Declaration of Independence was chosen; July second the "Resolution respecting Independency" was confirmed by representatives of all the colonies except New York. For two days it was debated, on the evening of the fourth day of July it was passed, and the next day it was officially promulgated. On July eighth the Declaration of Independence was read from a balcony in the State House square, and the bell, which for a quarter of a century had awaited this moment to fulfill the prophecy of its Biblical quotation, proclaimed free and independent the Colonies of America.

The bell's period of service was finally closed exactly forty-nine years after that day of rejoicing, when in tolling for the death of Chief Justice John Marshall its sides again cracked. It was then removed from the steeple, and now remains a monument in Independence Hall to the days when American Liberty was young.

Youthful feet that wander through the classic halls of the old Pennsylvania State House pause longest before reminders of the first republic's first president. To the children of Liberty, the name of Washington, "Freedom's first and favorite son," "the ideal type of civic virtue to succeeding generations," sums up all the elements of patriotism. "Washington is the mightiest name on earth," declared Abraham Lincoln, "long since mightiest in the cause of civil liberty, still mightiest in moral reformation." Hear Daniel Webster: "The name of Washington is intimately blended with whatever belongs most essentially to the prosperity, the liberty, the free institutions, and the renown of our country."

To the youth of the land this lustrous name is synonymous with Freedom, whose lessons they begin to learn in their primers. In the classroom, scholars receive instruction in loyalty to country, and initial training for their future obligations as citizens. The schools shelter the reserve forces of the nation, just as tender saplings are nurtured until the time when they will be uprooted and set in the open, to brave the winds that smite the forest. "Thy safeguard, Liberty, the school shall ever be."

The inspirational sources of the country's power, the mighty principles of its Constitution, are part of the teaching prescribed in American educational institutions. In recent years state legislatures have enacted laws providing for the display of the flag during school hours, for ceremonies that include a salute to Old Glory at the opening of each school day, for the observance of national holidays by special exercises, and for military instruction of public school pupils.

The promotion of patriotic study in the schools has, very appropriately, been fostered by bodies of Civil War veterans and allied organizations. Recognizing that "the training of citizens in the common knowledge and in the common duties of citizenship belongs irrevocably to the State," wise leaders have consistently impressed upon the students under their care that a share in the safety of American freedom rests upon them. Programs comprising military drills, camp life, first aid, nursing, and the conservation of food supplies are in force, or contemplated, in many schools throughout the United States, such instruction frequently being under control of the Federal Government.

That patriotism is something more than a sentiment is the principle that modern school children are learning. In the United States there is a marked revival of interest in history, civics, and national traditions, and an accelerated curiosity among both native and foreign-born youth as to the circumstances that led to the founding of the Republic, and the patriots that sponsored its creation.

"The sheet-anchor of the Ship of State is the common school. Let no youth leave the school without being thoroughly grounded in the history, the principles, and the incalculable blessings of liberty. Let the boys be the trained soldiers of constitutional freedom, the girls the intelligent mothers of freemen."

The accompanying gravure makes an especial appeal because of its simplicity. There is no posing in this group. The utter unconsciousness of the children, standing agaze before Washington's portrait, is evidence enough of the deep-rooted feelings that hold them there in silent contemplation of the Father of their Country.

THE MENTOR ? ? JULY 1, 1918 DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY

FANEUIL HALL BOSTON, MASS.

OLD NORTH CHURCH BOSTON, MASS.

THE LIBERTY BELL

CHILDREN OF LIBERTY

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