The USA in William Henry Harrison’s “Time” 1841
by Mike Donovan
General Harrison in 1813 President-elect Harrison
‘Old Tippecanoe’ – F.F.V. - Booze - Hampden-Sydney – First Whig President – Episcopalian – Granny Harrison – The Log Cabin and Cider Campaign - The final score was 234 to 60 – Liked Slavery - His father Ben signed the Declaration of Independence and his grandson became President. – ‘Keep the ball rolling’- Whiskey distiller – Battle of the Thames – 68 - “Tippecanoe and Tyler Too”
Popular vote 1840;
W.H. Harrison W) ---1,275,000
Van Buren D)- -----1,129,000
America fired the manager in 1840. Van Buren took the blame for the bad (very bad) economy and the voters showed him the door. The campaign was more about rejecting Van Buren than it was about accepting Harrison.
Harrison died in office about an hour and a half after taking office. Hw was 68 when he became President. He didn't make it to 69.
Contrary to his historical image as a military stooge merely standing for office, Billy Harrison was a very personable and engaging fellow, a general who knew the names of the enlisted men as surely as those of his officers.
Historians write of the Whigs “running a war hero” in 1840, as though being a war hero isn't much of a qualification to be a presidential candidate. A man who proved himself in a crisis. A man loved and obeyed by all his men who made bold and brave decisions under enemy fire just might make a trustworthy and strong civilian leader too. Billy H.H. was an active and intelligent individual with a strong personality. Harrison's lack of political baggage may have helped secure him the nomination, but he was not the nonentity that so many historians like to accuse all of the obscure Presidents of being.
The first Whig President, his Harrison name ranks third in US history in dynasties after the Adams and Bush families. If Hilary Clinton had won the Dem nom in 2008 the Clintons might have pushed the Harrison's to a tie for third.
Harrison was an old fashioned guy. He had to excuse himself to guests at 9:30 p.m., “I rise at the break of day.” That's the time I usually go to bed.
Harrison's cabinet
Secretary of State ---- Daniel Webster -1841
Secretary of War ----- John Bell----1841
Sec. of Treasury ------Thomas Ewing -1841
Att. General -----------J.J. Crittenden -1841
Due to his untimely death in office and the innovative nature of his 1840 campaign, and the fact that his Whig Party was so novel in itself, President Harrison is more remembered for his political campaign than for his presidency, a little bit like Jimmy Carter. Historians are rarely fascinated by Mr. Harrison but are quite taken with the campaign of 1840 that elected him.
The 1840 campaign is the first one that used all of the below the belt publicity stunts that from then on became standard in politics, and today is a refined art with high technology behind it.
The knock on Harrison is the same as that the Democrats later threw at Eisenhower; that he was not political at all and could just as easily have won as the candidate of the other party. Harrison was the first war hero/stooge as candidate. By choosing a man without a political past, the Whigs decided that assets were less important than an absence of liabilities. This clever and powerful political formula has long survived Harrison’s one month in office.
Hank Clay and Danny Webster, the big-Whigs, were supposed to control the elderly Harrison like a puppet but he double-crossed them by dying, leaving them to deal with the feisty Tyler.
Harrison gave his inaugural address in below freezing temperatures and contracted pneumonia. He died one month after taking office. Some say his seeing an endless parade of visitors at the White House also caused his death.
BIO
The ninth President of the USA was born on February 9, 1773 in Berkeley, Virginia. If, as was later claimed, Harrison was born in a log cabin, his had 22 rooms and two coats of expensive paint. WHH was born in high aristocracy.
Benjamin Harrison, William’s father, had signed the declaration of Independence for Virginia. Elder Ben was a close friend of George Washington. By the end of the Revolutionary War daddy was Governor of Virginia.
Like many 19th century presidents, a study of the life of W. H. Harrison is an adventure in the wild west of frontier America.
Raids from the traitor Benedict Arnold damaged the Harrison family farm in Virginia during the revolution.
Young William Henry wanted to be a doctor. In the fall of 1787 he took the local coach to Prince Edward County to begin his studies at Hampton Sydney College. The trip took two days. He soon transferred to the University of Pennsylvania where he studied medicine under the famous Dr. Ben Rush.
William studied hard in all required subjects but in his free time became enthralled with military history. He was torn between learning how to heal people and how to hurt them.
His choice was made for him when his father died and the funds for college ran dry. William then sought a commission in the US Army. No less a person than George Washington recommended him for officer school.
Harrison served as an aide to General “Mad Anthony” Wayne in the battles with the Indians of Illinois country (including Fallen timbers, 1794) and earned an impeccable reputation for bravery, honesty and reliability. In the battles against Indian leaders with names like “Little Turtle” and “Turkeyfoot,” Harrison acquitted himself so well that an officer reported of him, “Its my candid opinion that if he continues a military man he will be a second Washington.”
Harrison admired his boss, Anthony Wayne and WHH was one of the signers when Wayne negotiated the Important Treaty of Greenville in 1795, which settled for the time being the Indian troubles in the old northwest territory.
William was love-struck for a certain “Miss M” of Philadelphia but it never worked out. He wrote of her, “I love her so ardently I would forego my own happiness forever to contribute to hers.” Now that’s impressive. Miss “M” may have been Hetty Morris the daughter of the famous Robert Morris of Philly who married someone else, ending his dreams of self-sacrifice in the name of love. History has never ascertained the factual identity of Miss M, so you novelists can get to work on that one.
In 1795 he got over Miss M and fell in love yet again, this time to ‘a remarkably beautiful girl’ named Anna Tuthill Symmes, later to become the shortest termed First Lady of our country. Old man Symmes owned a lot of land. A lot of land. More than you’re thinking. Symmes did not approve of young Mr. Harrison, and said of him “he will never amount to a hill of beans.” When Harrison heard of this hurtful remark he wrote to a friend, Frederick Wilson of Putnam Connecticut, “Good! Who wants to be a hill of beans?”
Mr. Symmes forbade Harrison from courting his daughter. Harrison solved this problem by arranging a wedding anyway and absconded with the daughter long enough to tie the knot in the parlor of a friend, Dr. Steve Wood, who was also a justice of the peace.
Mr. Symmes tracked down the eloper two weeks later and asked him how in the name of Moses he planned to support his daughter. William Henry put his hand on the handle of his weapon and said, “My sword is my means of support, sir.” Little did the distraught dad realize that he was questioning the credentials of a future national war hero. We can cheerfully report that the groom developed a good relationship with the father-in-law long before WHH became famous and when the young couple had their first son, they named it after John Symmes. They would go on to have ten children.
Under prez 3 Jefferson Prez 9 Harrison became governor of Indiana Territory and looked favorably on the movement to allow slavery there. William Henry’s slavery position was never tough to read. He had brought two slaves with him from Berkley Virginia and they worked on his property. A Reverend James Lemen, who was opposed to slavery and opposed to Governor Harrison in the process wrote in his diary how Mr. Harrison had tried to pressure him to change his stance,
“Governor Harrison asked and insisted that I cast
my influence for slavery here. I not only denied
the request, but informed him that the evil attempt
would encounter my most active opposition.”
The first territorial legislature of Indiana was overwhelmingly pro-slavery. Nevertheless it was not formally legal there. Some clever laws were passed so that slaves could be brought in under the legal fiction of being indentured servants.
In the Indian wars, Harrison’s ‘chief’ opponents were Tecumseh and The Prophet.
William Henry negotiated extensively with the Indians and seems to have had compassion for them. His writings are full of lamentations for their sufferings. He worked strenuously to forbid the sale or trading of alcohol to them. In this era the making of bad business deals with Indians under the influence of alcohol (NWI – Negotiating While Intoxicated) was a standard low trick up the white man’s sleeve.
The British and the Indians were a natural alliance. Neither had the strength or political influence to stop the United States monster which was growing stronger by the month. But combined, they had a chance. The Indians wanted the Euros stopped for obvious reasons. The British did not want to see the USA grow into a continental superpower. Johnny Bull still had aspirations on the same continent. The Brits hoped to maintain their lucrative trade with the frontier country and keep their Indian allies. England also still had hurt feelings over the defeat of 1775-1783.
The British consistently dishonored treaty obligations agreed to at the end of the Revolutionary conflict with America. They were supposed to evacuate the forts on the western frontier and they did not. They were supposed to stop inciting the Indians to attack American settlements and they did not. The War of 1812 is commonly known to have begun over violations of American rights on the high seas. Yet the US vote for War in 1812 was slightly against on the east coast and overwhelmingly in favor in the western states. The War of 1812 can therefore be said to have been sparked principally in the west, where violence was horrific, and where there were no deep economic ties with the mother country as there were in the east.
In 1805 Harrison headed a strenuous negotiation with the Indians that resulted in the treaty of Fort Wayne. The Indians were not easily pacified on this one. The Miami tribe was against the treaty and had to be courted and appeased. It wasn’t so much a treaty as pacification for a pre-determined land-grab.
Harrison tried to explain to the angry Indians that the British weren’t really their friends. The British incite you to war, you lose the war, and then you lose the land with no compensation and a lot of new widows. The USA on the other hand was willing to BUY the land from you. No other European power was so inclined. If you had a friend in the white world, it was US, not them.
The historical problem with this logic is the paltry sums given for this valuable land. The treaty of Ft Wayne awarded 3,000,000 new acres of land to the white race, comprising the southwestern portion of modern Indiana. The payoff, given annually, was $1,750 for the three million acres. That was to split amongst the tribes, by the way. I bought an 11-year-old car four years ago for $1,650. Even allowing for the different currency values of then and now, less than 2 g’s for 3 mil acres was a bad deal for the Reds. (I junked the car when it broke an axle on a Boston pothole – I wish that was a joke)
Life on the frontier was precarious. One night in 1806 William Henry was walking through his house with his infant son John Scott in his arms when a bullet crashed through his window and hit the wall nearby. The perpetrator was never identified or caught. Little John Scott would grow up to be the father of the 99th President of the United States, Benjamin Harrison. Sometimes history is a game of inches.
Two Shawnee Indian leaders, Tecumseh and his brother “The Prophet” were no bigger fans of Harrison than many of the new historians who now consider William Henry one of the bad guys of the American pageant. Harrison and his pals had “negotiated” treaties recently with the area tribes depriving them of 48 million acres of hunting, fishing and farming and living grounds. These two braves were determined to unite many tribes in rebellion. They would duel with Harrison through the years of the War of 1812. It was a real life action movie.
By 1806 Tecumseh was angry with the Indian chiefs who had signed over these great tracts of land to the white man. Tecumseh believed in the ‘traitors die first’ philosophy of war. One of the Indian chiefs deemed guilty of giving away the store was hung between poles and burned alive. Others were captured, struck with hatchets, and thrown into burning fires.
The plot thickened when a white man murdered a Delaware Indian and the townspeople rose up in a mob and freed the killer from his Indiana jail. The Indians heard of this Indiana injustice and you can imagine their reaction.
Harrison tried to persuade the Indians to abandon the warpath. He quoted Agnew and said it was ‘time that we questioned the credentials of some of their leaders.’ WHH sent an emissary to the Delawares with this message,
“Who is this pretended prophet who dares to speak in
the name of the Great Creator? Demand of him some
proofs, some miracles. If he really is a prophet, ask
him to cause the sun to stand still, the moon to alter
its course.”
Unfortunately for Harrison a Tory read the message and explained to the Prophet that a solar eclipse was expected on the 16th of June. The Prophet (whose real name was Tenskwatawa) summoned as many followers as possible for the big date. He foretold of a miracle that day and sure enough the sun was blacked out of the sky. The crowd went wild and the name of the Prophet was spread with a new glory over the Indian lands.
By the summer of 1811 there were clearly war drums along the Wabash. Tecumseh and his brother the Prophet began to unite many tribes in an aggressive posture. The Chiefs that had negotiated the sale of Indian lands were disowned, condemned and as we have seen, sometimes killed. The Prophet and Tecumseh considered the old treaties null and void. Governor Harrison and the Americans did not. The treaties with the Miamis in particular were considered validly arrived at, and negotiated with responsible and significant Indian leaders.
More significantly, there were too many isolated incidents of murder and horse stealing by Indians against frontier Americans. Harrison was demanding that Tecumseh turn over the guilty Indians in these crimes. He said that President Monroe would never accept these incidents remaining unpunished. It was Harrison’s threat of war. Tecumseh and the Prophet were also threatening war by declaring abject non-recognition of the treaties in place.
The Indians agreed to a safe meeting at the ‘white central’ town of Vincennes. Both sides agreed to not arrive in force. The whites were worried. In the Indian culture a surprise attack from fake meeting would be a feather in their cap, not a shame on their honor. There was a history of such red treachery, the modern stereotype of all Indians being morally perfect notwithstanding. The tribes agreed to have about 80 braves with them for the meeting but showed up with over 200. At one point Tecumseh called Harrison a liar and the translator was afraid to pass it on to William Henry, but Tecumseh insisted. Tecumseh said that if the land of the 17 fires (the US flag) can be based on unity, then why couldn’t the red man unite his tribes into one without being accused of warlike intentions?
But war was in the air and it wasn’t hard to smell. Attacks on settlers continued and reports came to Harrison of unusually large supplies in arms and munitions being sold to the Indians by the British. Harrison petitioned President Monroe for regular army units to supplement his disorganized bands of militia. The great White Father was responsive and soon the Cavalry was on the way, cross-country.
The united forces of Militia and regular army troops left Vincennes to do battle with the Indians at Prophetstown. The Prophet had promised the squaws a white prisoner each to do what they want with as a slave. He told them that the whites did not have the stomach for fighting, that they were pacifists and farmers.
On the night of November 6/7 1811 Harrison and his men camped on a bend in the Benson River a little beyond Tippecanoe River. At dawn an Indian force attacked with the usual screaming, shooting, scalping and tomahawking. But the American camp held firm under their courageous commander Harrison who was always seen wherever there was the greatest danger. By the dawns early light the Americans charged out of the camp in a counterattack that worked. The Indians fled. They had not expected to be outnumbered for one thing and they had about 600 braves against about 1,100 under Harrison.
The Indian war cry of Terror didn’t work either. That worked both ways and the Union men yelled just as loud when they counterattacked as they Indians had to start it. They also took their fair share of Indian scalps, cutting them up so that each man could have a piece of one to put on his rifle.
Casualties were not one-sided either way, but The Battle of Tippecanoe was a victory for the non-native Americans, and as a result the Prophet was discredited among his people. The unity of the area tribes was flimsy to begin with and with the destruction of Prophetstown, the grand counterattack was over.
William Henry Harrison became a famous celebrity, the hero of Tippecanoe, but first he had to overcome a lot of criticism.
A couple of Congressmen suggested in the official record that Harrison had been caught by surprise by the Indians and should have attacked their encampment the night before the Indians attacked the American Army, and thus saved a lot of needlessly spent lives.
William Henry bristled at these charges. He sent a letter to Congress which was widely published saying,
“I was ordered to the Tippecanoe Creek area to try and find a peaceful settlement of Indian affairs, not to attack for the sake of attacking. Yes, the Indians attacked us first and we were momentarily caught off our guard. But the Indians had sent us an emissary requesting peace talks. I reacted to these peace overtures accordingly. The treachery was on them. My critics seem to think I should have attacked an unarmed civilian camp and slaughtered innocent people, and set back US-Indian relations thirty years. In any case, it would have been a difficult matter to sneak up on the Indian camp undetected in the first place. My critics are not only suggesting I should have done something inhumane, they are also asking me to have done the tactically impossible.
Harrison’s win at Prophet’s Town was glorious news in the USA. The Battle of Tippecanoe left a bitter dust trail for the Indians. Tecumseh went back to Prophetstown a few weeks later and cried among the ashes of what was left of his home. He made a solemn vow of eternal hatred, as though perma-hatred wasn't already there before making the vow.
The tribes fell that much more into the waiting arms of the British in their illegal frontier forts. 'Those Americans treating you bad? Come to us, friends. We'll treat you good' was the message the British insincerely gave the Indians, and they bought it like the British were re-selling Manhattan to them.
So when the War of 1812 broke out (I forget which year it started) it was easy to figure out which side the Indians of the frontier west would be on. The Red Man backed the Red Coats.
A lot of westerners wanted President Madison and Secretary of War Eustis to appoint Harrison to command US Forces in the west, but the job went to the aged General Hull, who would prove a buffoon in a crisis. Harrison did get a smaller command and went into the fight, but even here he was subordinate to General Winchester. Their first mission was to march out from Cincinnati and try to save Fort Wayne Indiana, its garrison of 70 men besieged by British and Indian men.
Harrison wanted to lead and all knew him as the famous hero of Tippecanoe, yet Winchester was chosen to lead. Winchester and Harrison became rivals. Letters in support of each of them to lead the Western Army went to Washington, to Kentucky, and to Indiana. The consensus seemed to be that Harrison was so much more beloved by his men that it didn't mater how competent Winchester might have been, what good did it do if he did not inspire men? From privates to generals, they all said and wrote the same thing. 'Please appoint Harrison to command the Army in the West. The men will follow him into a hot volcano. They won't fetch a water-bucket for Winchester.' There was some tension between the two men.
On August 22 1813 a letter arrived in Winchester's camp with a wax seal. It was from Washington. President Madison (who had actually wanted to send James Monroe out west to take over) had given William Henry Harrison command of the Army of the west.
The next afternoon the 2,000 troops were assembled in a hollow box. General Winchester stepped up to the plate and gave a great speech turning over command to his rival. He gave his full support not only to the man, but to the decision. It was noble. Winning the war was all that counted. The men broke into a wild cheer for Harrison, but they also sang 'for he's a jolly good fellow' to Winchester for cheering along with them.
Harrison gave a familiar war speech in which he told the men that anyone who wanted to change his mind and go home, can do so now. The Army will grant an immediate honorable discharge and if anyone wanted to go home to their family after all this hard marching the rest of us will understand.
One poor sap raised his hand. “I'd like to go home, if you please.” The rest of the men made a day long sport out of taunting the poor Private Sam Rice for his decision. They rode him around the camp on a log while they sang derisive songs to him. Then they forced him to get baptized in the river about 70 times in a row, dunking him under water “In the name of King George, in the name of Aaron Burr, and in the name of the Devil.” I can imagine being in that group of men when Harrison asked the question I can imagine being in that group thinking, “Should I? Should I?” - then not saying anything out of fear of exactly what happened to Rice, who must have been traumatized for life.
Another battle involving Harrison led to the infamous River Raisin Massacre of 50 US prisoners by Indian troops.
He led an invasion of Canada in 1813 and secured the theatre north of Detroit with his victory over a combined British and Indian force at the Battle of the Thames. The British fled the field and left the Indians to face the wrath of the American war hawks. Tecumseh, as he had predicted beforehand, did not leave the battlefield alive. The duel between Harrison and the Shawnee brothers was over, and the surrender of Hull was avenged.
Harrison resigned from the Army in 1814 feeling disrespected by the secretary of war.
WHH was elected to the US Congress from Ohio on 1816 and served until 1819. Then he became a member of the Ohio senate until 1821 before making the big jump to US Senator from 1825 to 1828.
In 1828 President Quincy Adams made Harrison Minister to Columbia, but President Jackson recalled Benny after he wrote an injudicious letter to the dictator of Columbia warning him not to become a dictator. Bolivar didn’t appreciate the fastidious Harrison telling him that, “to be eminently great it is necessary to be eminently good.”
Here’s a tough history question. “Kennedy was a Senator when he ran for President. Clinton was a governor. What was William Henry Harrison when he ran for President?” A: William Henry was the clerk of the Court of Common Pleas in Hamilton County Ohio when he ran for president in 1840.
Harrison was the last president born as a member of the British Empire.
EVENTS
ELECTION OF 1840
INAUGURATION
REFUSAL OF CLAY PATRONAGE
CAROLINE CONTROVERSY
DEATH IN OFFICE OF PRESIDENT HARRISON
ELECTION OF 1840
History calls it the “Log Cabin and Cider Campaign.” Historians get a little exited when they talk about it. 1840 was the first time that the race for president became show biz. It has been a part of show business ever since.
The Whigs ran a blue smoke and mirrors campaign of fluff, hot air, and stage pageantry while the Democrats ran like it was 1796.
The Whigs ran Indiana Jones, Billy Harrison, with the deliberate image of a man born and raised in a log cabin, when in reality it was Dem Van Buren that had been born in a log cabin and Harrison had been born in a comfortable house. Some history books really vilify the Whigs of 1840 for doing this. I don't think it was all that low.
Billy Harrison was the first “dark horse” to win the Presidency.
The campaign started with Whig party leader Henry Clay the favorite but he had too much Whig baggage. Clay made too many enemies along the way.
The behind the scenes party triumvirate of Greeley, Seward and Thurlow Weed launched a ‘Stop Clay’ movement at the Whig Convention at Harrisburg Pennsylvania.. Weed and Greeley were both newspaper editors, Greeley of the Tribune, Weed of the Albany Evening Journal. They successfully promoted the unknown Harrison instead of Clay.
To maintain full party support for Harrison, the South and the Clay supporters had to be appeased. So for Vice–President the Whigs nominated John Tyler of Virginia. Tyler was an ex-Democrat and an unapologetic slave-owner. Tyler lent a conservative balance to the lib Whig Harrison.
The Whigs were so divided into factions and fractioned on issues that their only hope for unity was to campaign without a platform. Basically they took no stand on anything and ran a war hero on his personal appeal.
It wasn’t easy for this party of merchants and wealthy landowners to run as the champion of the little man, but the Whigs pulled it off.
The Whigs mounted a vicious smear campaign against President Van Buren. They portrayed him as (accused him of being) a rich dandy who washed his jewelry in a solid gold bathtub while the rest of the country was hurting. It was an outrageous lie, but the Whigs ran with it. There were posters of Van Buren in thousands of dollars worth of effeminate fancy Euro clothing with him saying in a caption bubble,
“Bring me my slippers Chadwick. And put ten thousand more into the Royal Bank of England. But don't tell anyone.”
Congressman Ogle (W) told the House of Representatives that he had gone from room to room at the White House astonished with all the rich and arrogant material that was everywhere the eye could see. Ogle ogled it all in disgust,
“Everywhere was gilt eagle cornices, rosewood pianofortes, bergeres, tabourets, gilt plateaus, tambours, compotiers, silver tureens, and his toilet was sybaritic.”
I presume that the Congress understood all these terms, because I certainly don't. (I got these words from the Paul Boller book.)
The Democrats hit back at Harrison, but they didn't hit back soon enough or hard enough. They Dukakised their chances. Their mud-D slings included charges that Harrison had not performed bravely at all at the Battle of Tippecanoe in 1811. They also mocked his age, calling him “Granny Harrison” regularly. One Democrat editor said that Harrison “can't walk and chew gum at the same time.”
THE NEW AGE OF POLITICS
Andrew Jackson had merely opened the door to popular rule. Harrison kicked it in. That is his contribution to history, how he got in. Whiskey and fireworks elected WHH, not policies. From the election of 1840 on, the average American citizen would decide the elections, not the select aristocrats, even if aristocrats still were the ones who usually stood for election. The days of looking down one’s political nose at the commoner was over forever.
The log cabin Whigs won both Houses of Congress in the election of 1840 as well as the presidency.
How did the 1840 election campaign become the famous “Log Cabin and Cider Campaign?” A writer for the Baltimore Americana a Clay supporter wrote disdainfully of Harrison that William Henry was too old to run for President. The exact quote was that candidate Harrison should be,
“given a barrel of hard cider and a pension of two thousand
year, and, our word for it, he will sit for the remainder of
his days in a log cabin by the side of a ‘sea coal’ fire and
study moral philosophy.”
One of the Whigs at the convention decided that it was best to take the pile of sticks and stones that others throw at you and build a house with it. His idea was to adopt this jab at Harrison and make it the primary Whig campaign theme. From now on Harrison was to by called by his own supporters the ‘Log Cabin and Cider’ candidate. Here was the frontiersman of simple homey tastes as compared to the aristocratic snob Martin Van Dem Buren.
The Whigs built parade floats of log cabins on wheels with chained raccoons roaming about, and they paraded these exhibits through the squares of targeted towns. Whig volunteers gave away hard cider to happy voters by the thousands of gallons. They told crowds that their opponent Van Buren wore a corset and used Corinthian Oil of Cream to smell nice. They sang catchy tunes full of derision towards Van Buren and praise for the earthy virtues of WHH.
One part of one song, “Van, Van, is a used up man,” became a running campaign chant in the Battle of 1840. (Many histories quote these chants and songs at length but I always find antiquated song lyrics painful to read in dry print. I mean really painful. Historians, don't ever do that.)
Historians seem to have an anger over the campaign of 1840 that I do not share. They in effect say 'shame shame' on the campaign of 1840. It was quite a long time ago, but they write emotionally of 1840 of it being the first dirty campaign. Subconsciously I think they are just reacting more because the victim of the Log Cabin and Cider campaign was the Democratic party of Jackson, Dukakis, Clinton, and 90% of all history professors. If the Democrats had conducted the same low handed deceptive campaign it would probably not give them such an emotional charge.
So the Whigs were all bark and no bite and they fooled the public. As if politics wasn’t meant for fighting no-holds barred. It was all right when Andrew Jackson used image and false humility to win elections or if aristocrats FDR or JFK posed as a champion of the common laborer, but if the anti-Democrats, which is all the Whigs ever really were, did the same thing, then look out. We’re in for a lecture about dirty campaigning.
Thomas Bailey’s tirade about 1840, written in 1961 is typical,
“Claptrap was king, as the electoral debauch reached an
all-time intellectual low. …
Democracy calls for hard thinking, not hard cider. …
Yet an able, well-organized, and well-entrenched poli-
tical party, committed to solid principles, was hooted
out of office by a meaningless hoopla campaign.”
Bailey is so fond of the “solid” Democratic principles of 1840. He adds this of the Dems, “Even in defeat they were a stronger party than the Whigs.” It's true, Tom. They were solid and strong for slavery. Tom Bailey, a Stanford man is a great historian, but like 90% of all the US historians, he has an outrageous bias in favor of the Democratic Party. The Whigs were the lesser of two evils as far as black people were concerned, but that doesn't mater to Bailey. He thinks the best team lost in 1840.
The Whigs won by keeping it in neutral while the Dem record imploded on itself, and what's wrong with that? Rejection of the party in power is a legitimate form of political expression by the electorate. If the opposition merely has to sit and do nothing in order to see the incumbents voted out, then that is as legitimate a win as devising a complex platform to be held to. So what if they built a giant log cabin in the middle of Manhattan and used it for New York State campaign headquarters. So what if the Whigs lied about Martin Van Buren perfuming his whiskers and eating with gold forks? Van Buren was very aristocratic.
Anyway, it's the economy, stupid. The Panic of 1837 led to a long depression after and that's what booted Van Buren out of the White House more than cider and parades. If not for the economic hard times, the Log cabin and Cider campaign might never have made the general history books.
Its true that Van Buren was the one born in a log cabin and Harrison certainly was one of the well to do in America. But wasn’t there also some validity of the images? Van Buren was a rich and fastidious dresser. Davey Crockett said of him that when Van Buren walked into a room “I don’t know if it’s a diplomat or a dame.” And Harrison showed considerable bravery under fire at Tippecanoe. He was not just making some lucky decisions from the rear areas of the battlefield. A war hero is a man of the people. Harrison may have lived in a mansion but earned his mansion.
Harrison was also an active farmer and an experienced frontiersman. He was the rich neighbor who still got his hands dirty.
The Country in 1840 was in a great depression and Van Buren was caught holding the hot potato. An economic panic with a capitol P tossed that powdered whig VB out of Washington, not some kooky campaign gimmicks by the Whigs. A mule in a top hat could have defeated Van Buren in 1840. Even if the Whigs had done none of those things that they are condemned by history of doing, they still still might well have won. The election might have been more close, but the opposition still would have probably won, regardless of its name, its platform, or its candidate. Elections are lost as surely as they are won.
The historians say that the Whigs stole the Election of 1840. Whatever. Jackson had won in ‘28 because of the extension of the franchise to a lot of people with holes in their shoes that had nothing articulate to say on the issues. Harrison had every right to these dumb votes too. The Whigs essentially out-Jacksoned the Jacksonians in 1840. The Whigs outflanked the Dems in the rube theatre of operations.
I say three cheers for the Whigs! The Whigs had a better record on opposing slavery, their “Cotton Whig” element notwithstanding.
Among the other inventions of the 1840 campaign tricksters was a giant paper ball that was rolled from Indiana all the way to the Whig convention in Baltimore in December of 1839. It was a rolling rally and the ball was covered with Harrison propaganda. It is from this that we derive the popular slang, “keep the ball rolling,” meaning continue foreword with something, don’t let anything slow you down. (There was a weak 1960’s pop tune by that title.)
“Keep the Ball Rolling”
A distiller out of Philadelphia by the name of Charles Booze provided free whiskey in bottles shaped like log cabins. From him we get the nickname for alcoholic beverages, “booze.”
The Democrats also made mistakes to help out the Harrison campaign. The history books often neglect to tell you that part.
Andrew Jackson blundered. He gave a booster speech for his Dem pal Martin Van Buren in which he criticized the war service of Whig Harrison. AJ didn’t seem to appreciate that calling attention to war records was a bad idea. Even if Jackson's criticism of Harrison's war record was on target (which it wasn't), Van Buren had no military service at all. The speech hurt the Democratic cause.
The Whigs sometimes claimed to be the real representatives of Jeffersonian democracy. By their reasoning, Jackson had betrayed Jeffersonian principles, and the Whig Party was in the contest to try and restore them. Big Whig Webster denounced the Democrats for their opposition to higher protective tariffs. The Whigs were accusing the Democrats of taking the part of the rich. The Whigs were running in essence as the true Democrats.
Some history books imply than Harrison was a man without political qualifications. But Harrison was not, like Zachary Taylor, a man with no political experience. He had been a governor and a Congressman and a foreign minister. The war hero stuff was the finishing touch on a superb portfolio. Yes, the log cabin campaign was a lot of show biz, but Willy was a well-rounded hard-working man, an experienced political leader, and a bona fide war hero. There was something still standing after all the blue smoke had cleared.
Voter turnout in 1840 was a phenomenon. One million, four hundred thousand citizens had voted in the election of 1836. 2.4 million voters turned out in 1840, an increase of 60%. That made for the highest percentage jump in voter turnout from one presidential election to the other in USA history. What is even more noteworthy is that this giant leap was not primarily because of new rules for increased suffrage or because of population increase. The leap was primarily because a far higher proportion of eligible voters chose to show up and vote. Politics was becoming the national sport.
By the end of the century sports became the national sport. But in 1840 it was politics. Improvements in American education, transportation and dedication contributed to the spike.
1840 – Put on your Whig and break out the Booze
Harrison and Veep Tyler won the election but they couldn’t carry the state of their birth. Virginia voted for Van Buren.
Because of superior campaigning, a venerable politician incumbent with a lifetime of distinguished service, who happened to inherit a bad economy that was not his fault, was defeated by a slick 'I'm just plain folk' sort of guy from the middle west with no special qualifications except a great campaign team.
Sounds like 1992.
INAUGURATION;
The Whigs were euphoric between Election Day and Inauguration Day. Who could blame them? They had never been winners before and now the Democratic goliath had been slain. Little did they know that their choice of a virtual Democrat in the VP slot would come back to haunt them. The death of Harrison nullified the spectacular victory of 1840. Tyler would later be booted out of the Whig party while still President and the Democrats would seem to have won the election of 1840 after all.
Long exposure to a cold rain and wind at the Inaugural may have cost Harrison his life and his presidency.
Harrison’s African-American servant helped him off with his coat as he strode foreword hatless to deliver a two-hour address followed by the swearing in ceremony. Maybe the servant had whispered in his ear, “Don’t worry massa, its plenty warm out.”
Chief Justice (Dred Scott) Taney administered the oath of office.
Harrison had already ridden a horse for two hours through the cold streets before delivering the two-hour speech in the chilly little storm on the east steps of the Capitol. Accounts of the new President's speech and of its origin differ.
Some historians say that Daniel Webster wrote it. Others say that Webster edited it. Others say that Daniel tried to edit it down in size but Harrison would not listen. Historian Woodward calls the speech “pompous.” Webster complained of the excess of quotes by ancient Romans that he had to try and cut out. “I just killed 17 Romans,” he said after one chop session.
Harrison’s two hour talk was a long speech even by Bill Clinton standards and was delivered hatless and scarfless, which equaled brainless. Bill Henry was no spring chicken and he didn't handle it. Harrison developed a severe and ultimately fatal flu as a result.
Extremes of heat and cold cost the Whigs their only two elected Presidents. President Taylor would later succumb to the heat wave of July 1850.
1600 PENNSYLVANIA AVE – LAND OF IMPORTUNITIES
Harrison had one month in the White House. He used to walk to the neighborhood grocery store every morning and did his own gardening.
From the very first day he took office Harrison was besieged by office seekers. Some wanted jobs for themselves. More still wanted favors for a son or a friend. Added to this was the list of a thousand other important maters that were directed to him for decision. But the office seekers made him a candidate for depression.
Later on, when poor William Henry was dying, he became delirious with delusions of office seekers. Here he was, long past recovery, with no work to do, and he was moaning that “No, I can’t handle anymore office seekers.”
CLAY MIFFED;
The Whig big shots presumed that Harrison would let men like Clay and Webster become the power behind the throne while he attended ceremonies and read war books.
Shortly after the inaugural, Henry Clay came to see President Harrison and demanded jobs for a long list of his selected persons. Harrison rejected the approach and later summarily booted Clay out of the White House, followed up by a written note telling him, “You are too impetuous, among other things.” Harrison made it clear that Clay wasn’t even welcome to visit the White from now on without an appointment! William Henry made it clear which Henry was boss.
Clay was past angry. He was distraught. Clay was overheard pacing the floors frantically, complaining that his guy had won and now he couldn’t appoint a single friend into the lowest office. Henry returned home to Kentucky in an impetuous huff. So much for the image of Harrison as a man without a political will of his own.
Clay did manage to get Harrison to call for a special session of Congress for May of 1841 at which Clay hoped from his Senate seat to begin implementing the Whig program in spite of his poor personal relationship with the new Prez.
CAROLINE STILL FLOATS
During his few days in office Harrison was knee-deep in the ongoing Caroline Affair. The British were making threats that this could mean war if New York State executed a certain Mr. McLeod.
The story is worth recounting since it involves a scene of a ship on fire going over Niagara Falls with people leaping off and swimming desperately for land. Can't go wrong with any story that opens like that.
In the late 1830's there was a bit of an internal rebellion in Canada. There was full-scale fighting on the streets of Toronto, even more than the night Joe Carter hit the HR. 1,000 Canadian troops slugged it out with Irish rebels under a nut named McKenzie. The rebels fled to an island in the St. Lawrence River and declared themselves a nation of 800 people in rebellion against the Crown government.
Meanwhile, in New York state, civilians were supplying the rebels for whatever reason. They were ferrying help to them on a little ship called the Caroline. The CSS (Canadian Secret Service) decided it had had enough of the Caroline. They slipped over to the American side in the middle of the night, seized the Caroline and sent it over Niagara Falls in a blaze of fire as men dove off the ship and swam to shore in the nick of time. In the middle of all this someone in land shot and killed an American sympathizer in the back dead. In 1840 a man named McLeod bragged in an Elmira Bar that he had been the one that shot that guy that night. McLeod soon found himself in a New York State jail facing murder charges. The Canadian government found out that McLeod was a British citizen and came to his defense, claiming he was working for the Canadian government when he did it. Canada and Great Britain demanded custody of McLeod. He must not be tried by a New York court for acts he did in the service of her majesty. It didn't seem to bother the Canadian government that Mcleod had never worked for the government and that he in fact, was 300 miles away from the Caroline when it went over the Falls and the shooting happened.
Crisis Caroline was very much ongoing in the month that Harrison was President. If CNN had been around in 1841, it would have been all over the Caroline crisis on a daily basis and probably would have inflamed the controversy a hundred times more. Harrison never had a chance to establish warm relations with England. The two countries were at nearly at sword's point over an Elmira drunk in the tiny time of William Henry Harrison.
William Henry and his new Secretary of State ‘Dano’ Webster put pressure on Governor Seward of New York to grant a full release for McLeod and to drop the murder charge. Bu Governor Seward insisted that the case go to trial and that if McLeod were convicted, he would only then pardon McLeod to avoid an international crisis. Seward resented the pressure from the White House and State Department to back down on what he felt was an important principle. The unsolved Caroline/McCleod problem was passed on when Harrison passed on.
OPIUM WAR IN CHINA
Great Britain and China were in the middle of a brief but important foreign war in Harrison’s month. American trade and foreign relations were indirectly involved. This was the first of two Chinese Opium Wars (UK vs. China,) which touched three US Administrations.
The trouble started when China opened a few coastal cities to foreign trade in the early 1800’s it was soon discovered that the Asians had many things the Caucasians wanted but the reverse was not so true. A balance of trade deficit developed for the west in its dealings in Canton and Macao. A solution had to be found and it was. That solution was the stoner drug opium, stronger than hashish and less potent than pure heroin. No, I’ve never tried it.
The British picked up tons of ‘O’ in India and sailed it into Canton for sale throughout the country. 30,000 boxes of opium were being delivered annually into Chinese lungs by the middle of the 1830’s and American Yankee clipper ships were helping out in this evil business. Chinese work productivity fell as a million workers became lazy opium addicts.
The introduction of Indian opium into China changed the balance of trade completely. The British went from deficit to surplus in the China trade thanks to Opium. O was a hot commodity.
In 1839 the Chinese stood up to the British and seized all the opium it could find in Canton in a grand sting operation. All of the opium was publicly destroyed in great bonfires while a few winos sat upwind with a happy smile.
The British responded by declaring that ‘nobody touches the Queen’s dope’ and a war was on. The Chinese Opium War lasted until early 1842 and the Chinese lost. China’s military hardware was breathtakingly inferior to that of the British. The Middle Kingdom paid the price for its backwardness.
DEATH IN OFFICE OF PRESIDENT HARRISON
The first lady, Anna Symmes Harrison was preparing to leave Ohio for Washington when she received word that her husband, our 9th president was dead. William H. had contracted pneumonia on March 4 and had remained ill for one month before passing away shortly after midnight on April 4, 1841.
The oldest president ever elected (he was inaugurated at 68) Harrison was the first to die in office. What a coincidence! William Henry Harrison pledged in his inaugural speech that he would only serve one term. He was one of the few presidents to ever keep a campaign promise.
His last words, spoken to one of his cabinet members were,
“Sir, I wish you to understand the true principles of the government. I wish them carried out. I ask nothing more.”
Not that exiting, but that’s what he said.
The old Indian fighter had passed away but the Indians of the frontier were not jubilant. Indian agent Jack Johnston said that if the red man had been allowed the vote he did not know a single Indian who would not have voted for ‘their old friend’ Harrison.
Vice President Tyler was at Williamsburg when the President died and he was summoned to Washington immediately. The capitol city was dressed in mourning. Nearly every home had a black crape somewhere on the door. It was the first time an American President had died in office and came as something of a shock, both human and political.
President Harrison is buried in North Bend, Ohio.
Generally speaking General Harrison is becoming less and less popular as American History is being constantly re-written. In the politically correct era of today he is a man who robbed and killed Indians. Forty years ago he was a pretty good guy. Eighty years ago he was a great American hero. Who knows where he will stand in the future?
The Log Cabin and Cider campaign could have won even bigger if they had used my original campaign slogan,
“There is Simply No Comparison
To William Henry Harrison.”
SOURCES
The American Pageant, A History of the Republic, by Thomas A. Bailey of Stanford University – c) 1961 D.C. Heath
Bailey taught briefly at Harvard but was a Stanford institution most of his gloriously studious life. His lectures were reportedly as witty and lively as his writing.
Thumbs up on this one.
Empire for Liberty, by Basil Rauch and Dumas Malone, - c)1960
A Diplomatic History of the United States, by Samuel Flagg Bemis of Yale – c) 1934 Henry Holt
A lot of college students in the 1930's had Bemis for assigned reading. This is a fun book if you love history, but not if you don't.
A History of the American People, by Graebner, White & Fite c) 1970 provided the point about the Whigs usurping the Jeffersonian mantle. However this book makes it seem as though Whig leader Clay had President Harrison under his control form the moment he was sworn in and as if things were going along as planned when Harrison spoiled Clay’s spoils by dying. There is nothing about the shocking personal rejection of Clay’s leadership by Harrison that would seem to trump that point. Hopefully the fact that all three authors are Southern University professors has nothing to do with it. The Southerner Clay did not control the Northerner Harrison on his fingertips as these guys say he did.
They also mock Harrison’s inaugural speech as being “based on Roman history.” Using references to ancient Rome in a speech is not the same thing as basing the speech on Roman history. This is just part of the US history tradition if bashing a select group of so-called “non-entities,” and reaching out with extra effort to do so whenever possible. It’s a cheap-shot.
History of a Free People by Henry W. Bragdon of Phillips Exeter Academy, Exeter New Hampshire and Samuel P. McCutchen of New York University – c) 1954 MacMillan
I have enjoyed reading the fist 499 pages but only because I can write my own defiant graffiti on the margins when they give me the endless quiz and essay questions.
“Give three reasons why the election of 1840 changed American politics.” - No. You do it. You're the teacher and I'm the pupil, in case you forgot.
A History of Presidential Elections, by Eugene Roseboom; The author criticizes the writer for he Baltimore American who wrote the log cabin and cider article that sparked a campaign band-wagon. Roseboom says that the newspaperman showed “incredible stupidity.” I cannot agree. That was a freak accident of chance and history that this was seized upon and used by the intended victims for their own purposes. No one could have anticipated such a chance happening as the use of this phrase to build a propaganda campaign around.
A New American History, by W. E. Woodward c) 1938 waxes bitterly about the lost election of 98 years earlier. To the always feisty Woodward, the Democrats got their fingers burned in 1840 and learned a lesson they should bear in mind at all times in the future that “the American people do not vote for a candidate, but against a candidate. The suffrage, in national issues, expresses itself in malice.”
Woodward would be the expert on malicious self-expression.
Old Tippecanoe, by Freeman Cleaves c) 1969
A primary source at my level of historian. In other words, I rip off the people doing the hard work of primary historians. How many biographies are there of William Henry Harrison, and how many have this much detail on his early life? Not many.
This is a fairly good bio even though my hardcover has an annoying tear in the binder. Cleaves is notably objective about his subject. I wouldn't call it a fun or easy read, though.
Oxford History of the American People, by Samuel Eliot Morison -c)1965 Oxford University Press
The great mariner Morison claims that President Harrison had a drinking problem but no other historian has ever suggested this. Maybe it's Morison who has the drinking problem.
Out of Many, A History of the American People, by John Mack Faragher (Yale); Mary Jo Buhle (Brown), Daniel Czitrom (Mount Holyoke); and Susan Armitage (Washington State), c)1994 – Prentice Hall
Out of Many provided the point about high voter turnout.
A Patriots History of the United States, by Schweikart and Allen, c) 2004 is the source for the Hard Cider jab coming from a Whig and a Clay supporter. Most histories clearly infer that it is the Democratic opponents who started the cabin and cider ball rollin’, not supporters of a rival Whig.
Presidential Elections, by Paul Boller – c) 1984
Great book, but enough with the song quotations.
A Short History of the American Nation, by John A. Garraty (Columbia University) – c) 1966 Harper & Row
Garraty calls Harrison an “overrated President.” I'd call him a non-rated President. He was only in office a month, for Pete's sake. I'd call Garraty and overrated historian, even though I have almost finished the entire book. The writing is enjoyable, but the person is not.
The United States to 1865, by Michael Kraus of Columbia and CCNY – c) 1959 University of Michigan Press, Volume 4 of UM's History of the Modern World
This gorgeous hardcover is part of one of the finest efforts in the history of American history studies. I have several of these dark grey hardcovers that are a pleasure to hold, and to devour next to a pot of coffee. one of the Dulles brothers wrote one. I have one on India and another on the Middle East. My volume on Russian History was written by Warren Walsh, and was very good. They are all short histories that for the most part do not waste time, yet have academic standards that would please the egghead, even though they are written for general readers or college freshmen.
The United States: The History of a Republic, by Richard Hofstadter of Columbia, William Miller co-author of The Age of Enterprise, and Daniel Aaron of Smith – c) 1957 Prentice-Hall
Aaron graduated from Harvard in 1937 and taught at Smith from 1939 to 1969. Smith is famous for a large percentage of lesbians. When Aaron first started teaching there, Nancy Davis was one of his students. He asked her out when she graduated but she just said no.
|
|