Volume IV Part 64 (1/2)
At six o'clock in the evening of Monday, July 6, 1835, John Marshall died, in his eightieth year, in the city where American Independence was proclaimed and the American Const.i.tution was born--the city which, a patriotic soldier, he had striven to protect and where he had received his earliest national recognition. Without pain, his mind as clear and strong as ever, he ”met his fate with the fort.i.tude of a Philosopher, and the resignation of a Christian,” testifies Dr. Nathaniel Chapman, who was present.[1568] By Marshall's direction, the last thing taken from his body after he expired was the locket which his wife had hung about his neck just before she died.[1569] The morning after his death, the bar of Philadelphia met to pay tribute to Marshall, and at half-past five of the same day a town meeting was held for the same purpose.[1570]
Immediately afterward, his body was sent by boat to Richmond. The bench, bar, and hundreds of citizens of Philadelphia accompanied the funeral party to the vessel. During the voyage a transfer was made to another craft.[1571] A committee, consisting of Major-General Winfield Scott, of the United States Army, Henry Baldwin, a.s.sociate Justice of the Supreme Court, Richard Peters, formerly Judge for the District of Pennsylvania, John Sergeant, Edward D. Ingraham, and William Rawle, of the Philadelphia bar, went to Richmond.
In the late afternoon of July 9, 1835, the steamboat Kentucky, bearing Marshall's body, drew up at the Richmond wharf. Throughout the day the bells had been tolling, the stores were closed, and, as the vessel came within sight, a salute of three guns was fired. All Richmond a.s.sembled at the landing. An immense procession marched to Marshall's house,[1572]
where he had requested that his body be first taken, and then to the ”New Burying Ground,” on Shockoe Hill. There Bishop Richard Channing Moore of the Episcopal Church read the funeral service, and John Marshall was buried by the side of his wife.
When his ancient enemy and antagonist, the Richmond _Enquirer_, published the news of Marshall's death, it expressed briefly its true estimate of the man. It would be impossible, said the _Enquirer_, to over-praise Marshall's ”brilliant talents.” It would be ”a more grateful incense” to his memory to say ”that he was as much beloved as he was respected.... There was about him so little of 'the insolence of office,' and so much of the benignity of the man, that his presence always produced ... the most delightful impressions. There was something irresistibly winning about him.” Strangers could hardly be persuaded that ”in the plain, unpretending ... man who told his anecdote and enjoyed the jest--they had been introduced to the Chief Justice of the United States, whose splendid powers had filled such a large s.p.a.ce in the eye of mankind.”[1573]
The Richmond _Whig and Public Advertiser_ said that ”no man has lived or died in this country, save its father George Was.h.i.+ngton alone, who united such a warmth of affection for his person, with so deep and unaffected a respect for his character, and admiration for his great abilities. No man ever bore public honors with so meek a dignity ... It is hard ... to conceive of a more perfect character than his, for who can point to a vice, scarcely to a defect--or who can name a virtue that did not s.h.i.+ne conspicuously in his life and conduct?”[1574]
The day after the funeral the citizens of Richmond gathered at and about the Capitol, again to honor the memory of their beloved neighbor and friend. The resolutions, offered by Benjamin Watkins Leigh, declared that the people of Richmond knew ”better than any other community can know” Marshall's private and public ”virtues,” his ”wisdom,”
”simplicity,” ”self-denial,” ”unbounded charity,” and ”warm benevolence towards all men.” Since nothing they can say can do justice to ”such a man,” the people of Richmond ”most confidently trust, to History alone, to render due honors to his memory, by a faithful and immortal record of his wisdom, his virtues and his services.”[1575]
All over the country similar meetings were held, similar resolutions adopted. Since the death of Was.h.i.+ngton no such universal public expressions of appreciation and sorrow had been witnessed.[1576] The press of the country bore laudatory editorials and articles. Even Hezekiah Niles, than whom no man had attacked Marshall's Nationalist opinions more savagely, lamented his death, and avowed himself unequal to the task of writing a tribute to Marshall that would be worthy of the subject. ”'A great man has fallen in Israel,'” said Niles's _Register_.
”Next to WAs.h.i.+NGTON, only, did he possess the reverence and homage of the heart of the American people.”[1577]
One of the few hostile criticisms of Marshall's services appeared in the _New York Evening Post_ over the name of ”Atlantic.”[1578] This paper had, by now, departed from the policy of its Hamiltonian founder.
”Atlantic” said that Marshall's ”political doctrines ... were of the ultra federal or aristocratic kind.... With Hamilton” he ”distrusted the virtue and intelligence of the people, and was in favor of a strong and vigorous General Government, at the expense of the rights of the States and of the people.” While he was ”sincere” in his beliefs and ”a good and exemplary man” who ”truly loved his country ... he has been, all his life long, a stumbling block ... in the way of democratic principles....
His situation ... at the head of an important tribunal, const.i.tuted in utter defiance of the very first principles of democracy, has always been ... an occasion of lively regret. That he is at length removed from that station is a source of satisfaction.”[1579]
The most intimate and impressive tributes came, of course, from Virginia. Scarcely a town in the State that did not hold meetings, hear orations, adopt resolutions. For thirty days the people of Lynchburg wore c.r.a.pe on the arm.[1580] Petersburg honored ”the Soldier, the Orator, the Patriot, the Statesman, the Jurist, and above all, the good and virtuous man.”[1581] Norfolk testified to his ”transcendent ability, perfect integrity and pure patriotism.”[1582] For weeks the Virginia demonstrations continued. That at Alexandria was held five weeks after his death. ”The flags at the public square and on the s.h.i.+pping were displayed at half mast; the bells were tolled ... during the day, and minute guns fired by the Artillery”; there was a parade of military companies, societies and citizens, and an oration by Edgar Snowden.[1583]
The keenest grief of all, however, was felt by Marshall's intimates of the Quoit Club of Richmond. Benjamin Watkins Leigh proposed, and the club resolved, that, as to the vacancy caused by Marshall's death, ”there should be no attempt to fill it ever; but that the number of the club should remain one less than it was before his death.”[1584]
[Ill.u.s.tration: _The Grave of John Marshall_]
Story composed this ”inscription for a cenotaph”:
”To Marshall reared--the great, the good, the wise; Born for all ages, honored in all skies; His was the fame to mortals rarely given, Begun on earth, but fixed in aim on heaven.
Genius, and learning, and consummate skill, Moulding each thought, obedient to the will; Affections pure, as e'er warmed human breast, And love, in blessing others, doubly blest; Virtue unspotted, uncorrupted truth, Gentle in age, and beautiful in youth;-- These were his bright possessions. These had power To charm through life and cheer his dying hour.
Are these all perished? No! but s.n.a.t.c.hed from time, To bloom afresh in yonder sphere sublime.
Kind was the doom (the fruit was ripe) to die, Mortal is clothed with immortality.”[1585]
Upon his tomb, however, were carved only the words he himself wrote for that purpose two days before he died, leaving nothing but the final date to be supplied:
JOHN MARSHALL
The son of Thomas and Mary Marshall Was born on the 24th of September, 1755; intermarried with Mary Willis Ambler the 3d of January, 1783; departed this life the 6th day of July, 1835.
FOOTNOTES:
[1390] Marshall to Story, June 26, 1831, _Proceedings, Ma.s.s. Hist. Soc.
2d_ Series, XIV, 344-45.
[1391] Same to same, Oct. 12, 1831, _ib._ 346-48.