The caning of Charles Sumner, 1856: 17 primary sources
Newspapers, speeches, a letter and a meeting’s resolutions on the caning, from the weeks after it, May 23, 1856 – Jul 14, 1856, in their own words. The 17 passages come from Southern newspapers (6), Northern newspapers (4), abolitionists (1), politicians (4) and Black voices (2); the numbers count passages, and a writer can appear more than once. Free to print and copy for a class.
By name, the Black voices are a meeting of the colored citizens of Buffalo and a meeting of the colored citizens of Boston, and the abolitionist is Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Each passage below was matched, fragment by fragment, against the archive copy linked under it when our checker last ran, on Nov 4, 2026 (the verification record). The checker allows for differences in capital letters, quote marks, spacing and scanner misreadings, and nothing else. “[...]” marks words we left out; everything else is as in that copy, spelling included.
In class: give each student or group one source and the questions below. Then put two groups whose sources disagree side by side, and have them compare their answers.
Questions for any source here: Who wrote it, and for whom? What does it call the attack, and what does it say Sumner and Brooks each deserve? What does it want its reader to believe or do?
1 · Northern press
New-York Daily Tribune · New York
May 23, 1856
The particulars show that Mr. Sumner was struck unawares over the head by a loaded cane and stunned, and then the ruffianly attack was continued with many blows, the Hon. Mr. Keitt of South Carolina keeping any of those around, who might be so disposed, from attempting a rescue. No meaner exhibition of Southern cowardice -- generally miscalled Southern chivalry -- was ever witnessed.
Context (our note): Printed two days after the sack of Lawrence; the same editorial page (LoC scan sn83030213, p. 4) fuses the two events: 'The acts of violence during this session -- including one murder -- are simply overtures to the drama of which the... war upon the Free-State men in Kansas, constitute the first act. We are either to have Liberty or Slavery.' The germ of 'Bleeding Kansas and Bleeding Sumner.'
Source: New-York Daily Tribune, May 23, 1856, p. 4 (Furman Secession Era Editorials Project)
Read the whole original ↗ https://scholarexchange.furman.edu/secession-editorials/all/editorials/174
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-002
2 · Northern press
Boston Courier · Boston
May 23, 1856
The speech of Mr. Sumner was exceedingly insulting towards some gentlemen who sit with him upon the Senate floor. [...] When Mr. Sumner compares Senator Butler of South Carolina and Senator Douglas of Illinois to Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, assimilating one to the character of a crazy man and the other to that of a fool, he takes a ground which Massachusetts, in her dignity and her ability, never presented before.
Context (our note): The civility-discourse pivot in its purest form, from Sumner's own state the day after: opens by calling the attack 'unmanly' and 'brutal,' then turns to indicting Sumner's rhetoric. Closes: 'a different man takes his place, with only the memory of an insulting speech and a broken head.' Fragments joined with [...].
Source: Boston Courier, "The Attack Upon Mr. Sumner," May 23, 1856 (Furman Secession Era Editorials Project)
Read the whole original ↗ https://scholarexchange.furman.edu/secession-editorials/all/editorials/59
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-003
3 · Northern press
Cincinnati Daily Enquirer · Cincinnati, Ohio
May 23, 1856
Whatever reprobation may be visited on Mr. Brooks, and whatever opinions may be entertained in regard to the subject of debate, gentlemen everywhere will admit that Sumner's general tone was neither parliamentary nor gentlemanly; neither were his particular applications. [...] Regretting and condemning, as much as any one, the mode and measure of redress that was adopted, we yet, with great submission, would suggest that those who provoke attacks of this violent description are not without great blame [...] In short, those who play at bowls must expect rubbers!
Context (our note): The most explicit Northern-Democrat 'he provoked it' statement found — the title frames the caning as an exchange, and the closing proverb makes provocation the operative cause. The same paper accuses Douglass of bankrolling Harpers Ferry three years later, in the other feed. The Furman transcription duplicates one clause (dittography), removed as obvious garble; fragments joined with [...].
Source: Cincinnati Daily Enquirer, "Quid Pro Quo," May 23, 1856 (Furman Secession Era Editorials Project)
Read the whole original ↗ https://scholarexchange.furman.edu/secession-editorials/all/editorials/184
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-004
4 · Political
Sen. Henry Wilson · U.S. Senate
May 23, 1856
Mr. Sumner was stricken down on this floor by a brutal, murderous, and cowardly assault.
Context (our note): One sentence that nearly caused a second affair of honor: Butler shouted 'You are a liar!' from his seat, and Brooks sent Wilson a duel challenge. Wilson's reply: 'I thought so then: I think so now: I have no qualification whatever to make' — while refusing the duel outright.
Source: Sen. Henry Wilson, remarks in the Senate, May 23, 1856, in Charles Sumner: His Complete Works, vol. 5 (appendix)
Read the whole original ↗ https://www.gutenberg.org/files/48035/48035-h/48035-h.htm
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-005
5 · Northern press
Boston Post · Boston
May 24, 1856
The affair was disgraceful and we lament and condemn it; and not even the slander of an absent and aged relative or libel on his native state, affords sufficient apology to the assaulter. But surely the bitter tirade of personality, the wanton vituperation of high personal character, the absolute vulgarity of language, poured forth for two days by Charles Sumner ought not to be countenanced by those who would respect the dignity of the senate or the honor of the country.
Context (our note): New England's leading Democratic paper in the both-sides register: condemns the assault in one clause while ratifying its premise in the next — conceding Sumner committed 'slander' and 'libel' even while denying Brooks 'sufficient apology.' Drew a contemporary rebuke from the Pittsburgh Gazette. One continuous passage, no splice.
Source: Boston Post, editorial on the Sumner assault, May 24, 1856 (Furman Secession Era Editorials Project)
Read the whole original ↗ https://scholarexchange.furman.edu/secession-editorials/all/editorials/61
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-006
6 · Southern press
The Sun · Baltimore, Md.
May 24, 1856
It was bad enough that that hall should have been permitted to become the theatre of venomous invective and personal defamation between members, and that the tone of the public discussions there held should have been so lowered as we find them of late, (and in which, it must be conceded, Mr. Sumner appears as one of the adepts;) but it is indeed a humiliation and a degradation -- an offence, too, as it were to the whole country -- that its sanctity should have been so ruthlessly violated by such a scene as that enacted by Mr. Brooks.
Context (our note): Border-state moderate voice: one sentence performing the whole blame-distribution move — Sumner an 'adept' of invective in a parenthetical, Brooks's act the greater violation of the chamber's sanctity.
Source: The Sun (Baltimore), "The Assault in the Senate," May 24, 1856 (Furman Secession Era Editorials Project)
Read the whole original ↗ https://scholarexchange.furman.edu/secession-editorials/all/editorials/346
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-007
7 · Political
Peleg W. Chandler · Faneuil Hall, Boston
May 24, 1856
Every drop of blood shed by him in this disgraceful affair has raised up ten thousand armed men. [...] that blood now stains the Senate floor; and let me tell you, that not all the water of the Potomac can wash it out. They may cry, with the great tragic queen, "Out, damned spot!" but no water of this world can ever efface it.
Context (our note): A self-described political opponent of Sumner ('For more than one half that period I have been his political opponent') converted by the bludgeon — the hostile-witness register that made the Faneuil Hall meeting land. Text from the authorized Works appendix; no contemporary standalone pamphlet found openly digitized. Fragments joined with [...].
Source: Peleg W. Chandler, speech at the Faneuil Hall indignation meeting, Boston, May 24, 1856, in Charles Sumner: His Complete Works, vol. 5 (appendix)
Read the whole original ↗ https://www.gutenberg.org/files/48035/48035-h/48035-h.htm
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-008
8 · Abolitionist
Ralph Waldo Emerson · Concord, Mass.
May 26, 1856
The events of the last few years and months and days have taught us the lessons of centuries. I do not see how a barbarous community and a civilized community can constitute one state. I think we must get rid of slavery, or we must get rid of freedom.
Context (our note): Four days after the caning, at Concord's indignation meeting — the intellectual North's verdict, and one of the most-quoted Northern reactions of the decade.
Source: Ralph Waldo Emerson, "The Assault upon Mr. Sumner," Concord Town Hall, May 26, 1856
Read the whole original ↗ https://emersoncentral.com/texts/miscellanies/the-assault-upon-mr-sumner/
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-009
9 · Southern press
South Carolinian · Columbia, S.C.
May 27, 1856
We were not mistaken in asserting, on Saturday last, that the Hon. Preston S. Brooks had not only the approval, but the hearty congratulations of the people of South Carolina for his summary chastisement of the abolitionist Sumner. [...] The meeting voted him a handsome gold-headed cane, which we saw yesterday, on its way to Washington, entrusted to the care of Hon. B. Simpson. [...] We heard one of Carolina's truest and most honored matrons from Mr. Brooks' district send a message to him by Maj. Simpson, saying 'that the ladies of the South would send him hickory sticks, with which to chastise Abolitionists and Red Republicans whenever he wanted them.'
Context (our note): The replacement-cane wave, reported firsthand — plus a matron's pledge that 'the ladies of the South would send him hickory sticks, with which to chastise Abolitionists.' The same report records a Governor-headed subscription for a silver pitcher and approval meetings in four towns. Fragments joined with [...].
Source: South Carolinian (Columbia), "Public Approval of Mr. Brooks," May 27, 1856 (Furman Secession Era Editorials Project)
Read the whole original ↗ https://scholarexchange.furman.edu/secession-editorials/all/editorials/262
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-010
10 · Southern press
Edgefield Advertiser · Edgefield, S.C.
May 28, 1856
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. For our own part, we feel that our Representative did exactly right; and we are sure his people will commend him highly for it. We have often heard of a word in good season, but this is an act in good season.
Context (our note): Brooks's own home-district paper — 'our Representative' is Brooks himself — celebrating not just the caning but its theatricality before Sumner's constituents. One continuous passage, no splice.
Source: Edgefield Advertiser, "Capt. Brooks' Castigation of Senator Sumner," May 28, 1856 (Furman Secession Era Editorials Project)
Read the whole original ↗ https://scholarexchange.furman.edu/secession-editorials/all/editorials/258
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-011
11 · Political
Preston S. Brooks · Washington
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.
Context (our note): 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 [...].
Source: Preston S. Brooks to the President of the Senate, May 29, 1856, as printed in the Charleston Mercury, June 6, 1856 (Furman Secession Era Editorials Project)
Read the whole original ↗ https://scholarexchange.furman.edu/secession-editorials/all/editorials/256
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-012
12 · Southern press
Charleston Mercury · Charleston, S.C.
May 30, 1856
The South certainly has become generally convinced that it is by hard blows, and not by loud blustering and insulting denunciation, that the sectional quarrel is to be settled. We need not say that this has been our opinion for the last twenty years.
Context (our note): The fire-eater organ generalizing one caning into doctrine — violence, not debate, settles the sectional quarrel — and claiming twenty years' priority on the idea. Verified as the Mercury's own voice, not its quotation of a Northern paper.
Source: Charleston Mercury, "The Right View of the Subject," May 30, 1856 (Furman Secession Era Editorials Project)
Read the whole original ↗ https://scholarexchange.furman.edu/secession-editorials/all/editorials/255
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-013
13 · Southern press
Richmond Daily Whig · Richmond, Va.
May 31, 1856
The daily and hourly reports from Washington concerning the condition of Sumner, are all very strange and funny, and lead us to believe that the Abolition wretch, with his Abolition physicians as accomplices in the trick, is playing possum. [...] Now, for our part, we never have believed that Sumner was sufficiently hurt to make it necessary for him to take to his bed at all.
Context (our note): The injury-denial genre: Sumner as malingering fraud, his doctors as accomplices. (Sumner did not return to the Senate for three years.) The Whig's famous 'A glorious deed!' line could not be located in any fetchable primary this pass and is not used. Fragments joined with [...].
Source: Richmond Daily Whig, "Possuming," May 31, 1856 (Furman Secession Era Editorials Project)
Read the whole original ↗ https://scholarexchange.furman.edu/secession-editorials/all/editorials/287
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-015
14 · Southern press
Richmond Enquirer · Richmond, Va.
Jun 2, 1856
In the main, the press of the South applaud the conduct of Mr. Brooks, without condition or limitation. Our approbation at least is entire and unreserved. We consider the act good in conception, better in execution, and best of all in consequences. These vulgar abolitionists in the Senate are getting above themselves. [...] The truth is, they have been suffered to run too long without collars. They must be lashed into submission.
Context (our note): The most notorious Southern editorial of the crisis, and it survives through hostile amplification: Garrison reprinted it in full in The Liberator's 'Refuge of Oppression' column as evidence. The Enquirer's June 3 editorial (Furman) is a different piece reading 'lashed into obscurity'; McPherson's June 2 citation is confirmed by the reprint's attribution line. OCR-reconciled from the LoC scan.
Source: Richmond Enquirer, "The Sumner Discipline — the Needful Remedy," June 2, 1856, as reprinted in The Liberator, June 13, 1856, p. 1
Read the whole original ↗ https://www.loc.gov/resource/sn84031524/1856-06-13/ed-1/?sp=1
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-016
15 · Black voice
Colored citizens of Buffalo · Buffalo, N.Y.
Jun 27, 1856
Resolved, That the recent outrage committed upon the person of the Hon. Charles Sumner, of Massachusetts, by Preston S. Brooks, of South Carolina, a member of the House of Representatives, while said Sumner was sitting at his desk, in the Senate Chamber of the United States, was both cowardly and assassin-like, dastardly, mean and contemptible, [...] that while Mr. Sumner, in his affliction, has our warmest and most heartfelt sympathy, we leave the man Brooks with his blood-stained hands and steel-like heart to an enlightened public sentiment, which we believe will consign him to a tomb of everlasting infamy.
Context (our note): A meeting of Buffalo's Black citizens at the East Presbyterian Church, "on Sunday evening" (the paper gives no date; the card carries the Liberator's publication date), with Rev. J. A. Prime in the chair and George Weir, Jr. and Peyton Harris as secretaries. The resolutions speak in the meeting's own first person: "we the colored citizens of the city of Buffalo." The Sumner resolution sits among others on Kansas, and the same meeting rebuked the Free State men's Topeka Constitution for an article "prohibiting the emigration of free colored men" into Kansas. The omitted words say the act was worthy "not of an inhabitant of the Fejee Islands, but only of the source from which it emanated." Fragments joined with [...].
Source: "Meetings of Colored Citizens of Buffalo," resolutions of a meeting at the East Presbyterian Church, Buffalo, as printed in The Liberator, June 27, 1856, p. 3
Read the whole original ↗ https://www.loc.gov/resource/sn84031524/1856-06-27/ed-1/?sp=3
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-020
16 · Black voice
Colored citizens of Boston · Boston, Mass.
Jun 27, 1856
Resolved, That we, the colored citizens of Boston, regard the recent brutal, cowardly and murderous assault in the Senate chamber of the nation, upon our distinguished Senator, Charles Sumner—eminent alike for his eloquence, scholarship and philanthropy, not less than for his Christian statesmanship—with feelings of abhorrence and indignation.
Context (our note): A meeting of Boston's Black citizens in Rev. Mr. Grimes' church on Southac street, held "for the purpose of making a public expression of their indignation at the assault on Chas. Sumner" (the paper gives no date; the card carries the Liberator's publication date). Deacon Coffin Pitts presided. Robert Morris, Esq., Rev. Mr. Grimes, Mr. Robert Johnson, Rev. Mr. Hall and Dr. J. S. Rock spoke. The Liberator says "a series of resolutions offered by Dr. Rock, were passed" and prints only this one, so the card is bylined to the meeting that passed it. The same Liberator page carries the Buffalo meeting's resolutions.
Source: "Meeting of Colored Citizens of Boston," a resolution offered by Dr. J. S. Rock at a meeting in Rev. Mr. Grimes' church, Boston, as printed in The Liberator, June 27, 1856, p. 3
Read the whole original ↗ https://www.loc.gov/resource/sn84031524/1856-06-27/ed-1/?sp=3
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-021
17 · Political
Preston S. Brooks · U.S. House
Jul 14, 1856
I should have forfeited my own self-respect, and perhaps, the good opinion of my countrymen, if I had failed to resent such an injury, by calling the offender in question to a personal account. It was a personal affair, and in taking redress into my own hands, I meant no disrespect to the Senate of the United States, or to this House. [...] And now, Mr. Speaker, I announce to you and to this House, that I am no longer a member of the Thirty-fourth Congress.
Context (our note): The arc's coda, disclosed exception (July 14): the expulsion vote (121-95) fell short of two-thirds; Brooks resigned in defiance instead — and South Carolina's Fourth District re-elected him within weeks. Fragments joined with [...].
Source: Preston S. Brooks, speech on resigning his seat, U.S. House of Representatives, July 14, 1856 (pamphlet, Internet Archive)
Read the whole original ↗ https://archive.org/details/nationalpolitics00broo
On this site: disunionfeed.com/p/sc-019
Left out of this set
The Sumner caning feed has 21 sources. These 4 are not here because on that run our checker could not match their words to the archive’s text, or could not reach the archive. The record says why for each:
- Charles Sumner, May 19, 1856 — did not match the archive’s text
- Provincial Freeman, May 31, 1856 — did not match the archive’s text
- Frederick Douglass' Paper, Jun 6, 1856 — did not match the archive’s text
- Rep. Anson Burlingame, Jun 21, 1856 — did not match the archive’s text
Printed from https://disunionfeed.com/teach/sumner-caning/ — free to copy for teaching. Every source above is dated and cited; the verification record is at https://disunionfeed.com/verification/.