Andrew Johnson
Thomas Allen
On pages 88–89, in Facts and Falsehoods Concerning the War on the South 1861-1865 (Memphis, Tennessee: A. R. Taylor & Co., 1904), George Edmonds gives a good description of President Andrew Johnson’s emotional demise as president. He compares Johnson, who was deceived to abandon his State, with the Confederate soldier who honorably defended his State and country.
Johnson joined the enemy of his kindred. However, those whom he joined turned against him. Consequently, he pined away in melancholy. He illustrates what happens to a person whose envy drives him to hatred.
Edmonds writes:
“With one of these little pardon papers in his pocket, though his fields were laid waste, his peach-trees cut down, his cattle killed, his cotton gins, barns, stables, dwelling houses, all heaps of ashes, over which stood the chimneys ‘lone sentinels over the ruin;’ despite all this devastation, the poor Confederate soldier returned to his despoiled home with a feeling of satisfaction in the thought that at least the ground under his feet would be a resting spot for wife and little ones to stand on and work in, and look up from to the blue heavens above, and they thanked God for that much saved from the awful deluge of blood and the awful waves of flame that had swept over their country. My brother described the striking change he had observed in Mr. Johnson, the difference in the man since last they parted, the one to enter the camp of his people’s deadliest foes, and the other to take up arms in defense of home, country, life, liberty; all that men hold dear. Then Mr. Johnson was a strong, vigorous man, fronting the world and fate, hopefully expecting high success in life. He was now in the highest office in the land, but his aspect, his eyes, showed no pleasure in that success. A deep depression seemed to weigh upon him; hope, happiness seemed to have fled. The whole man seemed to be weary, care-worn; yet in spite of all that might be seen the man’s grim resolution to hold his own to maintain at the risk of his life the policy he had determined to pursue. Though Johnson was on the conqueror’s side and my brother on the conquered, the latter was more to be envied. He felt that satisfaction which comes from having performed a duty to the best of his ability. His soul was tortured by no remorse. He yielded to the inevitable without a murmur, realizing, as all the men of the South did, that it is no new thing in the sad history of humanity for the wrong to triumph over the right. The writer of this believes that Andrew Johnson did not join hands with the Republican party for any purpose of despotic rule. He abandoned his people because he was deceived into the belief that Republicans were fighting to restore the Union of our fathers. Though a man of strong native abilities. Johnson’s faculties and information were within limited boundaries. He knew but little of the Southern people beyond his own East Tennessee. In his own State, Johnson’s political enemies had accused him of anarchistic tendencies of intense hatred of the wealthy class. One orator had boldly, from the stump, said ‘Andrew Johnson so hates rich men, he curses God in his heart because He had not made him a snake, that he might crawl in the grass and bite the heels of rich men's children.’ One can imagine the horror that must have overwhelmed Johnson when he discovered that the party to serve which he had abandoned his own people and State, was monarchistic to its heart core, and had no intention of restoring the Union of our fathers; instead was determined to kill it, and erect on its ruins an Imperial Government. And to aid these men he had played traitor to his own State, to his own people! Who does not believe when Johnson came to know the truth, remorse, like a venomous serpent, lifted its head in his breast and fastened its fangs in his heart and gnawed and gnawed night and day. He had forever forfeited the affections of his own people, and now the men of the party he had served during the war hated him as fiercely as they hated the conquered ‘Rebel’ lying with iron fetters on his feet in the dungeon cell of Fort Monroe. Though every day of his life a thousand curses were hurled on the name of that ‘Rebel’ in Fortress Monroe, though iron chains and ball abraded and tortured him, though he was on the conquered side and Johnson among the conquerors, there is reason to believe that patient prisoner was a less miserable man than the man in the White House. The former felt no pangs of remorse; he well knew the more he was cursed and reviled, the tenderer and stronger would be the love of his own people. He was threatened with the death due to felons and assassins, but he knew no accusation of his enemies would abate one jot the reverence, the esteem his own people gave him. What recompense had Johnson? Where could he look for affection, for sympathy? Not one particle of pride or pleasure did Johnson derive from the high office he was in. The same Nemesis which had struck down his predecessor as he was about to take his seat for another four years on the throne of power, had upon Johnson her sleepless eyes, and, as he set his foot on the first step of Power’s throne, that Nemesis touched it with her fatal finger, and lo! it became like unto red hot iron, scorching, shriveling, tormenting his very soul day and night during the whole period of his stormy term.”
Copyright © 2024 by Thomas Coley Allen.
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