- M
rsBrooks of Medford
At 30 minutes past midnight this morning of Palm-Sunday the 4th. of April 1841. died William Henry Harrison, precisely
one calendar month as President of the United States, after his
inauguration— The first impression of this event, here where it occurred
is of the frailty of all human enjoyments, and the awful vicissitudes
woven into the lot of mortal man— He had reached but one short month
since the pinnacle of honour and power in his own country— He lies a
lifeless corpse in the Palace provided by his Country for his abode. He
was amiable and benevolent. Sympathy for his sufferings and his fate, is
the prevailing sentiment of his fellow-citizens— The bereavement and
distress of his family, is felt intensely, albeit they are strangers
here, and known to scarcely any one— His
wife had not yet even left his residence at North-bend,
Ohio, to join him here. An express was sent for her two or three days
since, but the tidings of death must meet her before she can reach this
city. The influence of this event upon the condition and history of the
Country, can scarcely be foreseen— It make the Vice-President of the
United States, John Tyler of
Virginia, acting President of the Union, for four years, less one Month—
Tyler is a political sectarian of the Slave-driving, Virginian
Jeffersonian school— Principled against all improvement— With all the
interests and passions, and vices of Slavery rooted in his moral and
political constitution—with talents not above mediocrity, and a spirit
incapable of expansion to the dimensions of the station upon which he
has been cast by the hand of Providence unseen through the apparent
agency of chance— To that benign and healing hand of Providence I trust
in humble hope of the good, which it always brings forth out of evil— In
upwards of half a century, this is the first instance of a
Vice-President’s being called to act as President of the United-States,
and brings to the test that provision of the Constitution which places
in the Executive Chair a man never thought of for it by any body.— This
day was in every sense gloomy— Rain the whole day. I attended public
worship first at the Presbyterian Church where there were less than 30
persons, and a stranger gave out two hymns, and made a short prayer.
Mr
Wood was to have reached home last Evening but did not—
The Cars from Philadelphia having failed to arrive at Baltimore in time
for the passengers to come on in those from Baltimore to this place last
Evening. The Stranger said that he himself came from Philadelphia the
day before yesterday, and from Baltimore last evening— That he was too
unwell to preach this morning but that he would preach at half past 3
this afternoon. The Congregation was then dismissed and I went to St. John’s Church where Mr Hawley
was reading the morning prayer for the Sunday before Easter. He preached
from Psalm 39.5—“Veryly, every man at his best state is altogether
vanity.” He said he had witnessed the death of the chief magistrate,
after prayers at his bed-side at 9 last Evening.— Mrs Brooks
widow of the late Governor Brooks’s
son dined with us.