HON. CHAUNCEY M. DEPEW.

New York, Dec. 23.—The New England Society celebrated to-night its 84th anniversary and the 469th of the landing of the Pilgrim Fathers with a dinner.

Mr. Depew spoke to the toast of “Unsolved Problems,” and in the course of his remarks he referred to the death of Henry W. Grady. He said:

“Thirty years ago, Robert Toombs, of Georgia, one of the ablest and most brilliant defenders of slavery, said in his place in the United States Senate that he would yet call the roll of his bondmen at the foot of Bunker Hill monument. To-day his slaves are citizens and voters. Within a few days a younger Georgian, possessed of equal genius, but imbued with sentiments so leavened that the great Senator would have held him an enemy to the State, was the guest of Boston. With a power of presentation and a fervor of declaration worthy of the best days and noblest efforts of eloquence, he stood beneath the shadow of Bunker Hill and uttered opinions justifying the suppression of the negro vote, which were hostile to the views of every man in his audience, and yet they gave to his argument an eager and candid hearing, and to his oratory unstinted and generous applause. It was triumphant of Puritan principles and Puritan pluck. They know we know that no system of suffrage can survive the intimidation of the voter or the falsification of the courts. Public conscience, by the approval of fraud upon the ballot and the intelligence of a community, will soon be indifferent to the extensions of those methods by the present office-holders to continue in 624power, and the arbitrary reversing of the will of the majority will end in anarchy and despotism.

“This is a burning question, not only in Georgia, but in New York. It is that the government for the people shall be by the people. No matter how grave the questions which absorb the people’s attention or engross their time, the permanence of their solution rests upon a pure ballot.

“The telegraph brings us this evening the announcement of the death of Henry W. Grady, and we forget all differences of opinion and remember only his chivalry, patriotism, and his genius. He was the leader of the New South, and died in the great work of impressing its marvelous growth and national inspirations upon the willing ears of the North. Upon this platform, and before this audience, two years ago, he commanded the attention of the country and won universal fame. His death, in the meridian of his powers and the hopefulness of his mission, at a critical period of the removal forever of all misunderstanding and differences between all sections of the Republic, is a national calamity. New York mingles her tears with those of his kindred, and offers to his memory a tribute of her profoundest admiration.”

EX-PRESIDENT CLEVELAND.

New York, December 23, 1889.

Mrs. Henry W. Grady: Accept the heartfelt sympathy of one who loved your husband for what he was and for all that he had done for his people and his country. Be assured that everywhere throughout the land warm hearts mourn with you in your deep affliction and deplore the loss the nation has sustained.

Grover Cleveland.

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HON. A. S. COLYAR.

Nashville, Tenn., December 26, 1889.

Mr. A. W. Davis, Atlanta, Ga.:

My Dear Sir:—I feel as if, in coming to what I had hoped to be a joyous occasion, I am coming to the house of mourning—the home of sorrow. Since the tragic end of the young Irish patriot, death has not more ruthlessly invaded the land of “shining marks” than when he the other day came to your beautiful city—a city of happiness and “high ways”—and, as if looking with remorseless purpose into the very secrets of domestic felicity and popular affection—took up and carried away into the land of the unseeable the idol of a happy home and of a great city. Not only was Henry W. Grady the idol of his own city and State, but without office and without estate, though young in years, he had attained a maturity of both pen and heart which brought renown as an American patriot far beyond what place or power can give. His death is a national calamity. In times of peace, when much of the press and many of the public men are inviting patronage and seeking favors in fanning the passions born of a sectional issue, to see a truly national and brave man, who, loving his own native section, can nevertheless glory in a common country and a common destiny for all the American people—is to the patriot philosopher, who divines the happiness of a reunited people, the bright star of hope rising to dissipate the prejudices of the past and light up the pathway to the coming millions.

Unfortunately, oh, how much to be deplored! the passions of the sections have been kept alive by the pen and tongue of the politician seeking patronage and office.

The young man of your city whose death all patriots mourn, put himself on a higher plane—freed from passion and rising above his own ambition, he gave tone and temper to a national sentiment, which might be uttered in 626Boston or Atlanta with equal propriety and patriotism and from the emotions of his patriotic heart, he spoke words which, while they were full of the manhood of his own loved South, nevertheless warmed into a generous sympathy the North man as well as the South man, and put American citizenship so high that the young men of the country may, without the sacrifice of local pride, ever aspire to reach it.

As an example of Southern manhood, patriotic fervor, and a statesmanship extending over the entire country and into the coming generations, all sparkling with the scintillation of an intelligent courage that defied alike the prejudices of the ignorant and the appeals of the demagogue, he was the representative and leader of a sentiment in the South which promised speedily a reforming of public sentiment north and south, a turning from the shades of the past into the lighted avenues of the future—these avenues opening to all alike without the sacrifice of manhood or the domination of section.

I repeat, his death is a calamity, and oh, how sad and mysterious!

Truly, A. S. Colyar.

HON. MURAT HALSTEAD.

Cincinnati, December 24, 1889.

Mrs. H. W. Grady:

I desire to inscribe my name among those who feel the public misfortune of Mr. Grady’s death as a personal loss, and hope you may know how true it is that there are no boundaries to sincere regrets and earnest sympathies.

Murat Halstead.

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HON. SAMUEL J. RANDALL.

House of Representatives,

Washington, D. C., December 24, 1889.

Hon. E. P. Howell, Atlanta, Ga.:

My Dear Sir:—I telegraphed briefly yesterday afternoon, immediately upon hearing of the death of our dear friend. I do not know when I have been more shocked than I have been at this great calamity, and I cannot yet bring my mind to realize it. The ways of Providence are strange indeed, but we should submit with Christian fortitude.

So young a man, with so bright a future, and capable of so much benefit to his State and country, it is hard indeed to part with. His great object in life was to break down sectionalism and bring the South to her full capabilities of development. But I have not the heart to write more.

Give Mrs. Randall’s love to Mrs. Grady and my kindest sympathy, and tell her that as long as life lasts with us Mr. Grady’s hundred and more kindnesses to both will never fade from our memory.

Samuel J. Randall.

MR. ANDREW CARNEGIE.

New York, December 24, 1889.

Captain Howell:

Only those who stood at Mr. Grady’s side as we did and heard him at Boston can estimate the extent of the nation’s loss in his death. It seemed reserved for him to perform a service to his country which no other could perform so well. Mrs. Carnegie and I share your grief and tender to his family profound sympathy. We send a wreath in your care which please place upon the grave of the eloquent peacemaker between the North and South.

Andrew Carnegie.

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MANY DISTINGUISHED CITIZENS.

Springfield, Mass., December 24, 1889.

The Honorable, the Mayor:

Springfield shares the sorrow of her sister city. The death of such a man as Henry Woodfin Grady is a national loss.

Edward S. Bradford, Mayor.

New York, December 24, 1889.

To Mrs. Henry Grady:

The New York Southern Society, profoundly affected by a sense of the public loss sustained in the death of your distinguished husband, offer you their heartfelt sympathy in the great affliction you have suffered.

J. H. Parker, Vice-President.

New York, December 23, 1889.

Governor Rufus B. Bullock:

Your dispatch is received with sincere sorrow. Thousands of our citizens recognized in Mr. Grady a man worthy of the highest respect and esteem, and will regard his untimely death a national calamity.

Alonzo B. Cornell.

New York, December 24, 1889.

Evan Howell:

Please give my earnest sympathy to Mrs. Grady. The profession has lost one of its three or four foremost members, and the country a true patriot.

Ballard Smith.

Transcriber’s Notes: Missing or obscured punctuation was silently corrected. Typographical errors were silently corrected. Inconsistent spelling and hyphenation were made consistent only when a predominant form was found in this book.