F 586 .D51 Copy 1 NELSON D E W^ E: Y. BY SILAS U. PINNEY. Memorial Address delivered before the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, January 2, 1890. 5WE2 NELSON DEWEY. n NELSON" DEWEY. BY SILAS U. PINNEY. [Memorial address delivered before the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, Jan. 2, 1890.] Since the last annual meeting of this Society, death has been busy in our midst and has reaped no inconsiderable harvest in the removal of the early pioneers and prominent citizens of Wisconsin; and we find but too frequent occa- sion to observe one of the leading purposes for which this Society was organized; namely, the preservation of fitting memorials of those eminent citizens who have faithfully served the State, and a record of whose lives and charac- ters are worthy to be preserved as a fitting testimony of gratitude for their services: that those who come after them may imitate their virtues, and profit by their example. We have, ii. this country, no Westminster Abbey, devoted to the greatness and glory of departed worthies, — no Pan- theon dedicated to the memory of our illustrious and hon- ored dead; no general place for collecting their monuments to perpetuate their achievements and renown. It is for us, in the absence of these, measurably to supply the place of these great mausoleums of the old world, by embalming in history, memorials of the lives, character and public ser- vices of our distinguished citizens. The history of our State, although its growth has been great, is as yet com- paratively brief, but replete with the deepest interest, promising still greater results in the future than those as yet realized. The grand drama of Western development that opened about fifty years ago, has unfolded gradually until from small and insignificant beginnings, the sparsely settled Territory and State has developed into what may well be termed a powerful empire, rich, populous, intelli- gent and prosperous, and the promise of to-day gives pres- age of still greater developments in the future. From the small beginnings of 1836, when Wisconsin had a population of about 12,000, we have now within our borders about 1,750,000. The sparse and thinly-scattered settlements that NELSON DEWEY. 67 then existed within our borders have expanded and coa- lesced and developed into a rich, prosperous and powerful State, and its progress in material wealth and general pros- perity has exceeded, and promises still to exceed, the most sanguine expectations. During the past year we have been called to mourn the loss of the first governor of the State of Wisconsin, — one long and prominently identified with public affairs, and all this unparalleled rapidity of growth and development, and who at the time of his death occupied beyond question the most interesting position and was the foremost figure among the public men of the State. Our pioneer governor. Nelson Dewey, departed this life on the 21st day of July last, at the age of seventy-six years, at his residence in Cassville, at the place where he settled on coming to the great West about fifty-three years before, at about the time of the organization of the Territory. He became at once prominent in public affairs, member at dif- ferent times of both branches of the legislature; and so strongly and so favorably had he impressed himself by his intelligence and ability, his fidelity and his integrit}^ in pub- lic trusts, upon the people, that he was chosen the first gov- ernor of Wisconsin upon its admission into the union, and upon him, in a large and important degree, was devolved the onerous duty of organizing the executive and adminis- trative departments of the government. With what skill and ability, with what rare judgment and discretion he dis- charged the delicate and responsible duties of his high office is well known to all familiar with early public affairs and was well attested by the skilful and harmonious oper- ation of the newly organized government. He was our strong, our tried and trusted chief. He bore aloft with firm and steady hand the standard of the State, and maintained, without tarnish or stain, its honor and dignity. Gov. Dewey belonged to the sterling and hardy band of Western pioneers, and in Wisconsin was one of the foremost and most distinguished among them. It was his privilege, to witness with them, during the last fifty years, the growth and development in Wisconsin similar to that in adjoining 68 WISCONSIN HISTORICAL SOCIETY. States, the like whereof in all human probability the annals- of civilization do not furnish a parallel. He was conspicu- ous and especially prominent in laying wide and deep the foundations of our civil institutions, and in organizing the State upon its change from Territorial to State existence, and was, so to speak, the master hand in shaping its early policy and starting it upon its subsequent prosperous career. Gov. Dewey was born in Lebanon, Connecticut, Decem- ber 19, 1813, and was the eldest son of Ebenezer Dewey and Lucy Webster, his wife. His remote paternal ances- tors came from Sandwich, near Dover, Kent county, Eng- land, in 1633. His father was a lawyer, and when his son Nelson was an infant of six months, they set out to • seek a new home where he might engage in the practice of his profession, in the then sparsely settled State of New York; and after the trials and perils incident to such an un- dertaking at that period, he settled at Cooperstown, New York, then a thinly settled locality with but few educational and social privileges. When he was about four and a half years of age his father took him back to Lebanon, Conn., where he lived with his grandparents until nearly eight years of age. In the meantime his parents had left Coop- erstown, and settled in the village of Louisville, Otsego county, New York, to which place he was brought by his parents when about eight years of age. Louisville was then a secluded village, scarcely noted upon the county maps or known beyond its borders. At this place he received such education as the common school afforded, and, like most young men of the period, when well advanced in the common branches of education he taught school one winter, and afterwards was sent to Hamilton Academy, at Hamil- ton, Madison county, New York, to complete his studies. This institution was connected with Hamilton University, an institution of learning founded at about the beginning of the present century, where young men prepared for the ministry, and which has sent out many noted scholars and divines. He attended the academy from the spring of 1830 until the close of the school year in 1833, and among his fellow students were Hon. William Pitt Lynde, late of NELSON DEWEY. 69 Milwaukee, Prof. John W. Sterling, late of the State Uni- versity, and Hon. Harlow S. Orton, one of the justices of the supreme court of Wisconsin, who with Gov. Dewey, in their day and generation have served the State of their adoption with distinction and ability, and attained to posi- tions of great honor and usefulness. Completing his edu- cation at the academy, he taught school one year in the town of Butternut (now Morris) in Otsego county, and de- voted considerable attention to reading law with his father, and at times with James W. Davis, and Nicholas Hanson, Esqrs., of Louisville, New York. He was a favorite of his family, and an affectionate, patient, diligent and indus- trious son, unostentatious and unassuming, mindful of the happiness of others rather than his own. This is the uni- form testimony borne in respect to his early years by those who then knew him; and these were his characteristics in his after years. In the fall of 1835 he continued his legal studies at Coop- erstown, in the office of Samuel Bowne, Esq., and early in May, 1836, he set out to seek fortune and fame in the un- settled Western Territories, intending to locate in that por- tion which was subsequently organized as Wisconsin Territory, but which was then within the limits of Michigan Territory. After traveling by various methods of convey- ance of primitive and uncertain character, with some con- siderable delay, he arrived at Dubuque and proceeded thence up the west side of the Mississippi river and crossed to Cassville, a city not yet built, where he took up his abode a few days before the Territorial government of Wis- consin was organized. Here he arrived on the 19th of June, 1836, and here he commenced a distinguished career which made him eminent as one of the first and foremost citizens of Wisconsin, and which has allied his name and fame with the history of our State as its first governor. With the energy and enterprise which was characteristic of his life, he at once sought employment, and for about a year was engaged as clerk and bookkeeper for Daniels, Dennison & Company, the proprietors of Cassville. The great tide of western emigration which had set in in the direction of 70 WISCONSIN HISTORICAL SOCIETY. Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin and what is now Iowa, wa& soon after materially checked by the financial reverses that followed the wild and reckless speculations which character- ized the business affairs of the country in 1S3G and '37. He was to seek and work out his fortune and future station in life in the valley of the Mississippi, a vast country of al- most boundless possibilities and unlimited resources, a sec- tion of country destined to become the seat of empire of this great and growing country, and in which there is yet to be displayed, on the grandest scale, the most perfect civ- ilization the world ever saw. "The world was before him where to choose, and Providence his guide." With his early training, his habits of methodical industry and su- perior intellectual abilities, it was evident that an active life of usefulness and honor was before him. Although modest and retiring by nature, and unassum- ing and unpretentious in his manners, his merits as a young man were soon perceived, and upon the organization of Grant county, March 4, 1847, he was elected its first regis- ter of deeds, and the early volumes of conveyances in that county, in his neat, but bold and firm hand writing, bear testimony to the careful and accurate manner in which he performed the duties of the office. In the summer of 1837, he was appointed justice of the peace by Gov. Henry Dodge, a position which he held for a considerable length of time, and in November, 1837, he re- moved from Cassville to Lancaster, the latter place having become the permanent county seat of the county, and lived there until the spring of 1855 when he moved back to Cass- ville. Doubtless his appointment to the humble office of justice of the peace was the means of bringing him largely in contact with the settlers of that county, and tended in no small degree to commend him to public confidence and es- teem. He was then about twenty-five years of age, versed in the rudiments of the law, gifted with an intelligence which gave him an insight into the ordinary transactions of life, and a sound practical judgment which enabled him to act with prudence and discretion; there were then but few young men in the Territory who possessed his business NELSON DEWEY. 71 qualifications and his ability to apply them and make them useful. His firm and vigorous conduct as a public officer in reference to a noted criminal case which arose in that vicinity, and in which he manifested a firm determination to see the laws of the Territory respected and obeyed, con- tributed to give him a reputation which soon led to his po- litical promotion and opened his way to a long life of honor and usefulness in the service of the Territory and State. In the fall of 1838 he was elected as a representative from Grant county to the second legislative assembly of Wisconsin Territory, and [ served in that capacity at the first session which convened at Madison November 26, 1838, at the second session which convened January 21, 1839, at the third session which convened December 2, 1839, and at the fourth extra session which convened August 3, 1840; and at this last session he was elected and served as speaker of the house of representatives. At about this time he commenced the practice of law, going into partner- ship with J. Allen Barber, of Lancaster, afterwards widely known and distinguished not only as a lawyer, but as a man of eminent ability and position in public affairs. This firm transacted an extensive business among the early settlers and principally among the miners of the country, taking part in a great portion of the most import- ant litigation of the time. They engaged also in the busi- ness of dealing in lands to a considerable extent, and acquired large and valuable interests. This partnership continued until some time in 1848 or 1849. Both members of is were strong partisans and politically opposed. Mr. Barber was a whig, adhering to the doctrines of that party as then defined and taught by Henry Clay, and Mr. Dewey was a democrat of the Jeft'ersonian school, supporting the policies of Jackson and Van Buren. In 1840 he was elected a member of the third legislative assembly and attended the first session which 'convened December 7, 1840, and the second session which convened December 6, 1841, In 1842 he was elected member of the Territorial council of the fourth legislative assembly and served in that capacity at the sessions in 1842, '43, '44, '45 72 WISCONSIN HISTORICAL SOCIETY. and '46; and at the session of 1846 was elected and served as president of the council. He had in the meantime, held various county offices and taken such high rank in public service and in the performances of his legislative duties, and had exhibited such marked ability and integrity as to have drawn the attention of the people of the Territory to his great merits and capabilities. After the adoption of the State constitution and the ad- mission of the State into the union, in May, 1848, and about twelve years after landing at Cassville, a poor boy without influence and without money, he was elected the first gov- ernor of the then new State of Wisconsin. He had risen by sheer force of industry and merit from his humble posi- tion to the highest place in the confidence and respect of the people of a sovereign State. He was inaugurated Jan- nary 7, 1849, and was reelected in 1850, and continued to be governor of the State until January 5, 1852. The duties of the exalted station to which he had thus been called, in organizing the various State departments and in putting the machinery of the new State government into practical operation, were delicate and responsible; but the keen intelligence, the sound practical judgment and business capacity of Gov. Dewey enabled him to discharge the duties of the position to which he had thus been called in a very able and satisfactory manner. He gave himself to the discharge of his official duties in this new position of great resposibility, with the same spirit of devotion and integrity that had characterized him through all his previ- ous public career. The procurement of proper books, the preparation of forms and devising methods of administra- tion as incident to the organization of the various departments of the new government, were duties assumed and performed by him as the executive, and of which he took personal supervision. How wisely and well he per- formed these delicate and responsible duties was attested by the harmonious and successful operations of the new gov- ment in its different departments. The period during which he was governor has often been referred to by men of both parties as that of " the model NELSON DEWEY. 73 administration." It was characterized by economy, integ- rity and a faithful and impartial administration of public affairs. It has been well said by one fitted to judge, " He left a clean record, and an example in his conduct and just management of the public interests that may have been well for the interests of the State had all his successors imi- tated it. He was a man of pure character and exalted sentiments, and no class or party could have dragged him knowingly into the commission of an unjust or unlawful act. He stood above and aloof from scandal, hypocrisy and low means and ways of the pot-house politicians and spoils seekers, and for these things the people of Wisconsin still love and cherish the memory of their first governor." The industry of Gov. Dewey in the discharge of the im- portant duties of his office was proverbial. His familiarity with the existing statutes of the Territory and State was remarkable, enabling him to fitly perform the duty of check- ing by executive veto crude and inconsistent legislation. Never excusing himself to visitors during the day, he often labored late into the night in preparing messages, official documents and in maturing executive business. He was dignified, affable and courteous to all and of such manifest integrity that even his warmest personal friends never ventured a suggestion by way of privately influencing his action upon any matter submitted to him for executive consideration. An earnest intention to carefully, honestly and impartially administer the government was always apparent in his deportment and conduct; and while he was a man of sound enlightened views and able to grasp, and deal with the most important questions, yet he gave to the details and minutias of his office the most scrupulous attention. After the expiration of the period of his service as gover- nor, he represented Grant county in the State senate at the sessions of 1854 and 1855. He was elected, January 29, 1849, first president of the State Historical Society of Wis- consin, under its first or original organization, and he served for quite a number of years as one of the regents of the University of Wisconsin. In 1874 he was appointed 74: WISCONSIN HISTORICAL SOCIETY. one of the board of commissioners of the State prison at Waupun, for a period of six years, and was re-appointed in 1880, and held that office until the commission was abol- ished and the board of supervision of State institutions was established in 1881. From the time he arrived at man's estate until the day of his death he attached himself to and was prominent in the councils of the democratic party, and was a firm and de- voted advocate of its principles. He was a strong partisan, and a thoroughly patriotic citizen. No man in Wisconsin, during the time of his public career, commanded in any greater degree the confidence and respect of his fellow par- tisans. He was indeed an oracle of the party, and his fellow democrats upon all proper occasions delighted to do him honor. He served frequently as delegate to conven- tions, local, state and national, and frequently was a can- didate for presidential elector. The impress of his strong will and masterly intelligence was made manifest on all these occasions. His party fell into a minority in his local- ity, in the State and in the nation, about 1856, and his official career was then practically closed. After returning to Cassville in 1855 he made that place his home the remainder of his life, with the exception of short intervals during which he resided at Platteville and in Madison. During his first term as governor, he was married to Miss Kate Dunn, the daughter of Hon. Charles Dunn, the dis- tinguished chief justice of the Territorial supreme court, and she survives him, and of this marriage there were born two children, Kate D. Dewey, now the wife of Theodore L. Cole of St. Louis, Mo., and Nelson D. Dewey, residing in one of the new Territories. When Gov. Dewey returned to Cassville in 1855, he had been successful in business pursuits and had what was then regarded as ample fortune. Here in near proximity to the place where his youthful journeying in search of a location came to an end, he built him a home, a mansion of almost baronial pretensions, and entered upon an elaborate system of beautifying the surrounding grounds and of improve- ment of his farm. Stone wall fences were extensively built. NELSON DEWEY. 75 roads constructed, arched stone bridges raised over ravines and gullies, and farm buildings were erected; all on an ex- tensive scale and constituting a grand and valuable estate. Here, as his long time personal friend has recently writ- ten, " In all the durability of structure, elegance of plan and embellishment of finish which modern architectural science could suggest, was erected his home, a marvel of beauty and attractiveness. Wide, open balconies looked out upon green lawns and waving meadow lands; while in the evening-tide from the lofty windows and observatory which crowned the mansion, the green slopes and undulat- ing ridges of the Iowa hills could be seen in the distance; and, nearer, flowing tranquil at their base, glowing in the golden rays of the setting sun, the still broad expanse of the Mississippi moving onward to the sea. From the clefts in the rock came trickling waters from the mossy fountains of nature and filled the fountains of art with the melody of their voices, casting off from their liquid surface a golden sheen, and a silvery light by night. Shrubs and many tinted flowers, fruits, ferns and trailing vines lent their charms and delicious fragrance to conceal the rough feat- ures of nature and enhance the beauty and attractiveness of the place." But an accidental fire did its work of des- truction, and all that had been so carefully planned and thoroughly built became a blackened ruin. He was devoted to the interests of Cassville and had its prosperity at heart from the time he settled there to the end of his life. He was its principal citizen, the life, energy and controlling spirit of the place. The building of a rail- road from Monroe to Cassville was one of the cherished schemes of his life. He planned for it, labored and spent much money for it, and considerable progress was made in preliminary work, but the financial crisis of 1873 blighted all hopes of its success. Unfortunately the latter portion of his life was clouded and embittered by misfortune and disappointments in which he had the sympathy of all who had known him, but all these untoward circumstances he endured quietly and without complaint. He struggled with misfortune as only 76 WISCONSIN HISTORICAL SOCIETY. one possessed with his courage and nobility of soul could do, preserving the same dignity of character and demeanor and the same affable and genial manner in his intercourse with his fellows that had characterized him in the more prosperous periods of his life. On the 21st day of July last, at his home in Cassville, surrounded by his friends and neighbors, he passed away full of years and of honors, uni- versally lamented and mourned by all who knew him. Well may we exclaim — •• Oh good gray head which all men knew. Oh iron nerve, to true occasion true, Oh fallen at length that tower of strength. Which stood four square to every wind that blew." Governor Nelson Dewey was no ordinary man. In any condition or calling in life, with his mental and moral char- acteristics, he would have achieved success and have be- come a leader among men: a positive force for the right in any community. He was a man of vigorous intellect, of marked individu- ality and traits of character, and a nature competent to ex- ercise and maintain a strong influence among men: modest, retiring and unpretentious, but gifted with a clear intelligence, sound judgment and firmness of purpose which needed no prompting to the performance of the full measure of official duty. With him, to know his duty was at once to perform it. No consideration could swerve him from it in the least. The sturdy simplicity and rugged in- tegrity of his nature commanded confidence and respect. Sprung from the common people, sympathizing with them and appreciating their wants and interests and ever willing to aid and assist to the full measure of his ability, the com- mon people understood and appreciated him. While he was a man of great firmness and strength of character, he was sympathetic, generous and charitable, giving with a free and willing hand to alleviate human misery and mis- fortune; and there are very many in that portion of the State where he made his home who owe their prosperity in life largely to his kindly assistance and advice. He was NELSON DEWEY. 77 firm and abiding in his friendships, and a man of such pos- itive and decided character that he was always influential among his fellow citizens and the prominent men of the State. His clear intelligence, his unflinching integrity and his devotion to duty rendered the strict and vigorous per- formance of his official duty comparatively easy and earned for him deserved confidence and repect where others would have hesitated or failed. In all that he did and aspired to do in public life, the taint of scandal or suspicion of wrong- doing never reached his name. His administration of the duties of chief executive was not only honest and beyond reproach, but he was impartial in his great office. He was the governor not merely of his party, but of all the people of the State. He understood that his duties had to do as well with matters without, as within the executive cham- ber, and that the constitution he had sworn to support re- quired him "to take care that the laws be faithfully exe- cuted.'' He imparted to methods of administration that spirit of frugality, economy, integrity and republican sim- plicity that were characteristic of his early training, and while the influence of his many personal and civic virtues have made their appropriate impress and cannot be lost, it were more than a mere neglect that they should not be con- spicuously perpetuated for the salutory example they afford to all who may come after him in rule and authority. Like most of those who have influenced and controlled the affairs of States of the nation, under our popular system of government based on equality of political rights, Nelson Dewey was essentially a self-made man. He had not the beneflt of the adventitious aid derived from wealth or the influence of powerful relatives or friends. While he was doubtless better equipped by education than most men of his years who stood at that time in competition with him, the native vigor of his mind had not been over- laid or buried beneath the mere flowers and ornaments of learning, but without its ripe fruits. The example of his life is a most instructive one to young men entering upon the active duties of life, to encourage effort and stimulate am- bition and remind them of the possibilities of life, and to 78 WISCONSIN HISTORICAL SOCIETY. show to how great an extent success or failure lies within themselves, and within the compass of individual effort, if opportunity for effort is afforded. When he came to Wisconsin the weak voice of Western emigration was that of an infant demanding care and nurture, but it grew to the volume of a loud myriad-voiced multitude, like the swelling tide of a mighty sea coming in to occupy and fill the land. The country was then in its primeval freshness and beauty, fresh as if from the hand of the Maker, and he lived to see the forest opened to the sunlight and the dew, and the broad plains and sun-lit valleys filled Avith the wealth and progress of all the manifold triumphs of modern civilization; to behold the more perfect mastery of man over the resources of nature and the marvelous progress in the arts and sciences and in human culture and refine- ment, which has so greatly distinguished the last fifty years over preceding ages. The record of his life and public services is interwoven with the history and progress of the State. There is no need of massive monument of granite or polished shaft of marble to keep alive the mem- ory of his name, character and public services. His monu- ment, like that of his contemporaries, the early pioneers, is in the result of his labors. We have but to look around and behold what they have builded and developed so wisely and well; to look upon the material wealth and prosperity of a great populous, progressive State upon a happy, intelligent, law-abiding people. In the midst of such surroundings after a long, active and useful life, endeared to the people of the State by the memory of public services honorably rendered. Gov. Nelson Dewey, full of years and earthly honors, possessed of the confidence and respect of his fellow citizens and mourned throughout the State, has gone to his peaceful and honored rest. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 016 098 133 lip