Disunion Feed

"For our own part, we feel that our Representative did exactly right; and we are sure his people will commend him highly for it. [...] The beauty and propriety of the proceeding consists, to no small extent, in the fact that it was accomplished while yet the galleries had not emptied themselves, and while many of Sumner's constituents were probably there to look upon the deed. [...] We have often heard of a word in good season, but this is an act in good season."

Brooks's own home-district paper — 'our Representative' is Brooks himself — celebrating not just the caning but its theatricality before Sumner's constituents. Fragments joined with [...].

Read it in the original — Furman Secession Era Editorials transcription ↗

Next post: Preston S. Brooks, May 29, 1856 →

"It is with unfeigned regret I find in the report that what I had intended only as a redress of a personal wrong had been construed into or must necessarily be held as a breech of privilege of the Senate. [...] I had read attentively and carefully the speech delivered in the Senate on the 19th and 20th instant by the Senator from Massachusetts, and found therein language which I regarded as unjustly reflecting, not only upon the history and character of South Carolina, but also upon a friend and a relative."

Brooks in his own words, framing a near-fatal beating as mere 'redress of a personal wrong'; the Mercury's editors call the letter 'written in an admirable spirit.' Period spelling 'breech' preserved in the excerpt. Fragments joined with [...].

Read it in the original — Charleston Mercury, June 6, 1856 (Furman transcription) ↗