Category: History Page 1 of 2

Grumpy opinions about American history

Who Were The Huguenots?

On January 24, 2024

François de La Nouea, a Huguenot Captain

Today’s post is a guest column by my wife Margie. This first appeared in the January 2024 issue of the newsletter of the Daniel Boone Chapter of the Sons of the American Revolution.

One day I received an interesting text from my cousin, Mary. She had been accepted into the Huguenots Society and said that due to our lineage, I could be a member. So, with her help, I am now a member. The Huguenots were French Protestants who were active in the 16th and 17th centuries. They were forced to flee France due to religious and political persecution. The Huguenot Society of America was founded in 1883 to perpetuate the memory of Huguenot settlers in America. George Washington was the grandson of a Huguenot on his mother’s side. I am a descendant of Barbara de Barrette who was a Huguenot and lived in Valenciennes, France, around 1657. She married Garrett Van Swearingen and they settled in Maryland. Last October John and I enjoyed going to the 2023 Huguenot Society of America Conference in Macon, Georgia. We had never been to Macon and enjoyed meeting fellow members and visiting historic landmarks such as the Hay House and the Cannonball House and, of course, eating great southern cuisine. Check the internet to find out more about the Huguenots. It is very interesting reading and who knows, you, too, may qualify as a member!

If you would like to contribute a guest post, please contact me. The Grumpy Doc can always use a little help from his friends.

Christmas in Colonial America

By John Turley

On December 15, 2023

In Commentary, Food and Drink, History, Travel

In the United States today, we have a very expansive view of what constitutes Christmas celebrations. We don’t find it at all unusual to see an inflatable Santa Claus next to a manger scene. The wisemen are as likely to be following neon snowflakes as yonder star. This combination of religious and secular is something that we just accept without a whole lot of thought. But it wasn’t always the case. In colonial America Christmas was celebrated in a mostly religious fashion when it was celebrated at all.

Colonial New England

Colonial New England was settled in large part by Puritans. They even extended their influence to areas that they did not initially settle. They went so far as to banish, and in some cases even execute people who did not agree with them. They were determined to create a society dominated by Puritan beliefs.

The Puritans did not favor Christmas celebration; they believed there was no scriptural basis for acknowledging Christmas beyond doing so in prayer. In 1621 Governor William Bradford of Plymouth Colony criticized some of the settlers who chose to take the day off from work because as Puritans he felt that they could best serve God by being productive and orderly.

The celebration of Christmas was outlawed in most of New England. Calvinist Puritans and some other protestants abhorred the entire celebration and likened it to pagan rituals and “Popish” observances. In 1659, the General Court of Massachusetts forbade, under the fine of five shillings per offense, the observance “of any such day as Christmas or the like, either by forebearing of labour, feasting, or any such way.” The Assembly of Connecticut, in the same period, prohibited the reading of the Book of Common Prayer, the keeping of Christmas and saints’ days, the making of mince pies, the playing of cards, or performing on any musical instruments. These statutes remained in force until they were repealed early in the nineteenth century.

It is important to note that Puritan hostility to Christmas was not because they did not believe in the divinity of Jesus Christ. They objected to the way the holiday was being celebrated. They disliked the excesses of Yuletide festivities in England. Christmas had become a time for the working class to drink, gamble, and party. The Puritans would not tolerate any sign of disorder and believed that it was an affront to God.

They tried to protest Christmas revelries while still living in England but had little impact. Once they moved to the New World where they were able to exert control, they would not condone any form of excess. Except, perhaps, an excess of piety and self-righteousness.

Any form of Christmas observance that did occur took the shape of fasting, prayer, and religious service. Even the famous New England cleric Increase Mather loathed Christmas and believed the holiday was derived from the excesses of the pagan Roman holiday Saturnalia. We shouldn’t think that Mather was completely humorless; he once called alcohol. “a good creature of God “. Drinking wasn’t bad, but like all things it must be done in moderation with complete self-control. That’s probably good advice for everyone, whether they’re a Puritan or not.

Middle Atlantic Colonies

Many of the traditions that we now consider part of the American Christmas have their origins in the middle Atlantic colonies, most notably in Pennsylvania. Many of these were brought by settlers of German heritage as well as some traditions brought by the Scots and the Dutch.

In Pennsylvania there were two quite different Christmas traditions, one of the protestant groups and another of the Quakers. They differed considerably in their approach to Christmas.

Some colonists celebrated Christmas by importing English customs such as drinking, feasting, mumming and wassailing. Mumming involved wearing masks and costumes and going door-to-door singing carols or performing short plays in exchange for food or drink. Wassailing was a tradition where people would go from house to house singing carols and drinking toasts to the health of their neighbors. Some non-Puritan New Englanders also continued these traditions but kept them private to avoid attracting the attention of the Puritan officials.

Many of the Christmas traditions that we think of as being a quintessentially American are derived from the settlers of German descent who were known as the Pennsylvania Dutch. These include celebration of the advent season, the decoration of the Christmas tree, singing of Christmas carols, the display of nativity scenes, and the exchange of gifts on Christmas Eve or Christmas morning. We can’t imagine Christmas without these things, but we seldom remember that it was our German American ancestors who gave us these wonderful traditions.

To me the most interesting and probably most significant tradition passed on by the Pennsylvania Dutch was what led to our current concept of Santa Claus. During the colonial period, they had the tradition of Beltznickle. He is depicted as a man wearing furs and a mask and having a long tongue. He’s usually shown as being very ragged and wearing dirty clothes. He had a pocketful of cakes, candies and nuts for good children, but he also carried a switch or a whip with which to beat naughty children. Beltznickle took the naughty and nice list very seriously.

He was a long way from Clement Clark Moore’s jolly old elf in ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas and the jovial Santa Claus that we know today from the original Coca-Cola ads of 1930.

Quakers had a much different approach to Christmas. They did not celebrate it at all. It is not that they were opposed to Christmas as were the Puritans. It’s just that they did not celebrate any holidays, Easter, birthdays or any other holidays. They had no set liturgical calendar, so they did not have an advent, or an Easter season or any other religious holiday. There is no central Quaker authority to set beliefs or doctrines. Each Quaker is free to decide how to observe religious traditions. They focus on spiritual reflection and social justice.

Non-Quakers did not always understand their religious beliefs or practices. Here is an example of how Quaker practices were seen by outsiders. Swedish naturalist Peter Kalm visited Philadelphia in 1747 and recorded the following observation in his diary:
Christmas Day. . . .The Quakers did not regard this day any more remarkable than other days. Stores were open, and anyone might sell or purchase what he wanted. . . .There was no more baking of bread for the Christmas festival than for other days; and no Christmas porridge on Christmas Eve! One did not seem to know what it meant to wish anyone a merry Christmas. . . at first the Presbyterians did not care much for celebrating Christmas, but when they saw most of their members going to the English church on that day, they also started to have services.
Apparently, Presbyterians were much quicker to adopt popular practices then were the Quakers.

Southern Colonies

Celebration of Christmas was similar throughout all of the southern colonies. We’ll consider Colonial Williamsburg as a proxy for the rest of the southern colonial region. This is largely because there is more information available about Williamsburg than other areas and because it represented what was the majority of practices at the time. The major religion of the southern colonies was Church of England and they followed those practices.

Religious services were a central part of their celebration. The majority of the religious observances were during the advent season, the four weeks leading up to Christmas which were a period of reflection on the significance of the coming of Christ. The southern colonies usually held Christmas Eve services although occasionally Christmas Day services were held. Christmas Day was considered a day of celebration and family feasting.

It should be noted that the Christmas celebration was only for the white population. If the enslaved people received a holiday for Christmas, it was only because the weather was too bad to work in the fields. And of course, the house slaves were expected to attend to all the needs of the Christmas celebration.

Margie and I decided to visit Colonial Williamsburg in December of 2019, the period we refer to as BC (before COVID). We’ve always had a special affinity for Williamsburg because that’s where we spent our honeymoon 52 years ago. I’m not sure exactly what I was expecting, perhaps a large inflatable George Washington holding a Christmas wreath. But it was much more understated than what I had anticipated.

According to our tour guide, even those low-key decorations were probably more than would have been evident in the colonial era. People typically decorated their homes on the day before Christmas and removed the decorations the day after Christmas. Decorations were usually limited to candles in the window and pine boughs on the tables and mantle pieces. Pine boughs were used to decorate the church in what was known as “sticking the church”.

At Colonial Williamsburg we saw many displays that included fresh fruits and pineapples. Our tour guide told us that those were too precious to actually have been used as decorations and might have been included as part of a table display to be consumed during the Christmas feast. Some people would even rent a pineapple to display on their table as a sign of their wealth.

The first Christmas tree did not make its appearance in Williamsburg until 1848.

The southern colonists were very social people. They enjoyed wassailing as did the people of the mid Atlantic colonies. They also considered Christmas as a time for feasting, dancing, and celebrations. Men of the upper class celebrated Christmas with fox hunts and other outdoor activities. Men of the working classes frequently celebrated Christmas with shooting matches and drinking parties. Women, of course, were expected to stay at home and prepare the meals. Christmas Balls were a common practice among the upper class of the southern colonies. They were often elaborate and included large banquets with musicians, dancing and occasionally masquerades.

Present exchange was not standard practice in the southern colonies. However, it was common to give children small presents of nuts, fruit, candy, and small toys. Adults generally did not exchange presents.

Virginian Phillip Fithians writing in his journal in 1773 gave the following description of a gather just before Christmas: When it grew to dark to dance. . . . we conversed til half after six; Nothing is now to be heard of in conversation, but the Balls, the Fox-hunts, the fine entertainments, and the good fellowship, which are to be exhibited at the approaching Christmas.

Life in colonial America could be hard, but that did not stop them from having a joyous Christmas celebration.

Hamilton And Lincoln Still Have Something To Tell US

By John Turley

On September 26, 2023

In Commentary, History

Objections and Answers respecting the Administration
of the Government

Alexander Hamilton 18 August 1792

“The truth unquestionably is, that the only path to a subversion of the republican system of the Country is, by flattering the prejudices of the people, and exciting their jealousies and apprehensions, to throw affairs into confusion, and bring on civil commotion…

When a man unprincipled in private life, desperate in his fortune, bold in his temper, possessed of considerable talents, having the advantage of military habits—despotic in his ordinary demeanour—known to have scoffed in private at the principles of liberty—when such a man is seen to mount the hobby horse of popularity—to join in the cry of danger to liberty—to take every opportunity of embarrassing the General Government & bringing it under suspicion—to flatter and fall in with all the non sense of the zealots of the day—It may justly be suspected that his object is to throw things into confusion that he may “ride the storm and direct the whirlwind.””

Speech to the Young Men’s Lyceum of Springfield

Abraham Lincoln 1838

Is it unreasonable then to expect, that some man possessed of the loftiest genius, coupled with ambition sufficient to push it to its utmost stretch, will at some time, spring up among us? And when such a one does, it will require the people to be united with each other, attached to the government and laws, and generally intelligent, to successfully frustrate his designs….

Distinction will be his paramount object, and although he would as willingly, perhaps more so, acquire it by doing good as harm; yet, that opportunity being past, and nothing left to be done in the way of building up, he would set boldly to the task of pulling down….

I first came across these quotations in an article by Jeffery Rosen published in the Wall Street Journal. The Grumpy Doc does not need to add anything further to them and will leave them for your thought and consideration.

Civil War Trivia

By John Turley

On August 26, 2023

In History

On January 12, 1864, President Lincoln went to Fort Stevens north of Washington, DC to observe military actions by the soldiers defending the capital against the Confederate cavalry of General Jubal Early. Lincoln became the only sitting United States President to come under direct fire from enemy troops. Reportedly, a young officer named Oliver Wendell Holmes (a future Supreme Court Justice) said to Lincoln “Get down you, damn fool”.

Ulysses S. Grant was the first army officer to hold the rank of Lieutenant General since George Washington.

One of General Grant’s ongoing problems was political generals. Because the army expanded so quickly, many people with little or no military experience were commissioned as officers because of political connections. Former senators, congressmen and governors frequently became generals. A number of these were placed in critical combat commands. Many of the early union setbacks can be partially attributed to the ineptitude of political generals who either were unable or unwilling to follow the orders of the professional army. (It must also be admitted that a few regular army generals were inept, but they were easier to set aside.) It wasn’t until late in the war that Grant finally had sufficient influence to be able to dismiss a number of these political generals.

Future Confederate General James Longstreet was a groomsman at the wedding of Ulysses and Julia Grant. He was a West Point friend of Grant’s and Julia’s cousin as well.

Lincoln first offered command of the Army of the Potomac to Robert E Lee. Lee refused, resigned his commission in the United States Army, and returned to Virginia where he swore allegiance to the Confederacy. The first official commander of the Army of the Potomac was General George B. McClellan. General Irwin McDowell commanded the union forces at the first battle of Bull Run, but those forces had not been designated as the Army of the Potomac at that time.

Lee was not the first choice for command of the army of Northern Virginia. The first commander of what would eventually become the army of Northern Virginia was General P. G. T. Beauregard. Interestingly, he also designed the Confederate battle flag which is today widely considered as the “Confederate flag”. It was designed because of the confusion between the Confederate national flag, the stars and bars, and the United States flag. General Beauregard relinquished command to General Joseph E. Johnston when his army was combined with Johnston’s larger army group. Lee did not become commander of the army of Northern Virginia until Johnston was wounded in battle and unable to continue.

The Civil War did not end with the surrender at Appomattox Courthouse on April 9, 1865. On April 26th, Joseph E. Johnston surrendered his larger army of 90,000 soldiers. On May 26th General Kirby Smith surrendered the Army of the Trans-Mississippi, the largest confederate force still operating on land. The last Confederate flag was lowered when the open ocean raider CSS Shenandoah surrendered to the British in Liverpool on November 6th. Interestingly, almost half of the Shenandoah ‘s victories over merchant ships occurred after the surrender at Appomattox.

The surrender at Appomattox Courthouse occurred in the home of Wilmer McLean. In one of those interesting coincidences of history, McLean originally lived near Manassas VA and his property was part of the battlefield of Bull Run. He moved to Appomattox Courthouse to try to get as far away from the fighting as he could.

At the beginning of the Civil War, Ulysses S. Grant was not even in the army. Initially, despite being a West Point graduate, he was refused a commission in the regular army and his first Civil War commission was in the militia.

Grant and wife were initially scheduled to be in the box with President and Mrs. Lincoln at Ford’s Theater on the night the President was assassinated. At the insistence of Julia, the Grants left Washington that afternoon. There’s been much speculation about why they did not attend the theater. Among the many reasons put forward are: Julia missed her children whom she had not seen for almost three months; Julia did not wish to spend time with Mrs. Lincoln whom she found disagreeable and with whom she had several contentious meetings; and one which seems most interesting, she was reported as being very worried about someone that she thought had been watching her all that day and she felt they needed to get away. The assassins did report that Grant had been one of their initial targets so this may be a true report.

Emancipation Proclamation only freed slaves in Confederate held territory. Slavery was not officially abolished in the entire United States until December 6, 1865, with the ratification of the 13th amendment.

Counting both northern and southern casualties, more Americans died in the Civil War than in all other American wars combined. The most recent estimate of the number of Civil War deaths on both sides is placed at about 750,000. Of that number, almost 2/3 died from disease.

At the end of the Civil War the United States had the largest army in the world. In 1860 the US Army had been about 16,000. At the end of the Civil War, it is estimated the army was slightly over one million. It is estimated that a total of about 2.6 million served in the US Army during the Civil War. There are no reliable estimates of the total number to have served in the Confederate Army.

Grant’s drinking was largely overstated. The stories of his dinking stem from a period, early in his career, when Grant was assigned to an isolated fort on the West Coast and his family remained on the East Coast. He suffered depression and loneliness. Throughout his life he had anxiety when separated from his family. While in the west, he began bouts of binge drinking. He missed his family to the point that he resigned from the army even though he had no job prospects at the time. There is very little report of any drinking by Grant’s following his return to the army during the Civil War, although rumors were plentiful. When given reports of supposed excessive drinking on Grant’s part, Lincoln is reported to have said “Find out what whiskey he drinks and send a case to all of my generals”.

Grant smoked up to 20 cigars a day and admirers from all over the country mailed him boxes of cigars. He eventually died of cancer of the throat and tongue.

The poet Walt Whitman worked as a volunteer in union hospitals.

Lew Wallace, author of Ben Hur, was a general in the Union Army. By most reports he was a better author than general.

The last verified Civil War veteran died in 1956. He was Albert Woolson who served in the Union Army as a drummer boy. There were three men who claimed to be Confederate veterans who lived longer than Woolson; however, one of those has been completely debunked and no confirmation of service of the other two has ever been found.

Things You May Not Know About George Washington

By John Turley

On June 18, 2023

In Appalachia, Commentary, History

We all know a lot about George Washington. Or do we really? And is everything we think we know true? We all know he was the first president, but was he really? He was the commander in chief of the Continental Army, and there is no question about that. He is often called the father of his country. But did you know that he never had any children?
The fanciful tales about George Washington began to circulate while he was still alive. Everyone has heard the story of the chopping down of the cherry tree and how the young George Washington could not tell a lie and that he did it with his little hatchet. Did you know that this story was created for one of the first biographies circulated about George Washington? It was a best seller written by Parson Mason Weems who was more interested in promoting morality than in historical accuracy. We also have the story of how Washington threw a silver dollar across the Potomac. Even though money went further in those days, it is unlikely since the river is about a mile wide at that point.

Presidential Dentures

We’ve all heard how Washington had wooden false teeth. It’s true that he had false teeth; he suffered with dental problems his entire life. But they weren’t made of wood. Washington began to lose his teeth in his early 20s. He had several sets of dentures made throughout his life, including one that incorporated hippopotamus ivory. He also had a set that incorporated human teeth. In the 18th century dentists were known to purchase healthy teeth from living donors who were in need of cash. The dentist would then incorporate these teeth into dentures for their clients. The dentures were cumbersome things that involved metal plates and gold wiring. Can you imagine having these in your mouth?

The First Entrepreneur
George Washington owned and operated one of the largest commercial distilleries in the early United States. Following his presidency, he began work on his distillery at Mount Vernon. He produced mostly rye whiskey, and it was quite profitable. So, not only was Washington first in war and first in peace but he was first in cocktails as well. (That makes him even more of a hero to me!) Margie and I visited Washington’s distillery as recreated at Mount Vernon. I even bought a bottle of his Mount Vernon whiskey that you can see below on my bookcase.

I haven’t yet tried it. The distiller told me it was considered to be very smooth for its day. When I asked him what we would consider it in our day, he said “Pretty rough.” Perhaps some year, on the anniversary of the Battle of Brooklyn Heights, I’ll use it to make a Mount Vernon Manhattan (or not).
Even though Washington owned a major distillery, rye whiskey was not his favorite drink. When at dinner or sitting around the fire with friends he enjoyed a glass of Madeira. It is a fortified wine made on the Portuguese island of Madeira. Washington began ordering Madeira from his London agents in 1759 and continued ordering throughout his life. He usually ordered wine in “pipes” of 150 gallons. He seldom traveled without a large supply of Madeira.
We’ve all been taught to think of George Washington as a planter. But now we know he was distiller as well. Will it surprise you to learn that he was also a commercial fisherman?
When tobacco prices started to fall, Washington looked for ways to diversify his income. He had almost 10 miles of shoreline on the Potomac River. He bought boats and nets and set his enslaved workers to the task of catching shad, herring, perch, and sturgeon. The fish were cleaned, packed in salt, and sold all over the colonies and even shipped to Europe. He went so far as to buy a sailing schooner that he used to ship his fish to such places as Portugal and Jamaica.

A Mountaineer?

Would you believe that George Washington was once a major landowner in what is now West Virginia? Washington received major land grants for his service in the French and Indian war and he also purchased grants from others who were not interested in developing their wilderness land. He owned land at the mouth of the Kanawha River in the area that is now Point Pleasant, West Virginia. He also owned land along the Kanawha River from the mouth of Coal River up to the area that now includes Charleston. So, we can honestly say George Washington was a West Virginian.

The Traveler?
George Washington only made one trip out of what would become the United States. He had been largely raised by his older half-brother Lawrence after his father died. Lawrence had been suffering from tuberculosis and was advised to spend the winter in the tropics. Nineteen-year-old George agreed to go with him on a trip to Barbados. Two important things happened while he was there. He had the opportunity to meet British Army officers and study fortifications and learn about British military armaments and drill. This was the beginning of his lifelong love of all things military.
But perhaps the most important and least well-known portion of this trip was that Washington contracted and recovered from smallpox, leaving him with lifelong immunity. Smallpox had ravaged the colonies for several years and was devastating many units of the Continental Army. Imagine the fate of the revolution had Washington died of smallpox in 1777.
As a result of the epidemic, he issued one of the first public health orders from the American government. He ordered that all recruits arriving in Philadelphia for the Continental Army be inoculated against smallpox. This practice was soon spread across all colonies and even veteran soldiers who had not yet had smallpox were inoculated.
There are many more fascinating things about George Washington, and I will include them in a future post entitled Even More Things You May Not Have Known About George Washington.

The First Question and Final Answer
In case you think I’ve forgotten my question about the first president, Washington was the first president, under the constitution. However, prior to the adoption of the Constitution, while under the Articles of Confederation there were eight men who held the title of President of the Congress and whom some historians consider to be Presidents of the United States. But, unless you’re a true history nerd, you’ve never heard of John Hanson, first president under the Articles of Confederation. It’s The Grumpy Doc’s opinion that his lack of accomplishments earned him his well deserved obscurity.

For even more interesting facts about Washington, see the website www.MountVernon.org.

Presidential Trvia

By John Turley

On May 29, 2023

In Commentary, History

Who Am I?

Two of my favorite subjects are American history and trivia. When Margie and I first got married one of our favorite ways to spend time with friends was to play the then popular game Trivial Pursuit. That’s when I discovered that I am the master of useless information, the repository of all things that will never earn me any money. But it’s still fun and when I can combine my love of trivia with my love of American history, so much the better. This is the first of what I hope will be a series of posts about American history trivia. We’ll start with the presidents. A subject that most of us know a fair amount about but maybe not as much as we think.

Before I go into the questions, we’ll start with the mystery man above. That’s James Buchanan, the 15th president of the United States. Now The Grumpy Doc must admit that he did recognized this fellow. If you did, bonus points for you. However, no prize for beating The Grumpy Doc beyond a sense of satisfaction that comes from besting the master. Did I mention that not only am I grumpy, but I’m also cheap?

The first question should be an easy one.

Who was the first president to have a full beard while in office?
Who was the last president to have a full beard while in office?
What president had the first telephone installed in the White House?
What two presidents had only a letter for a middle name?
What president established the first National Park?
Who was the first president to serve in the Navy?
Who was the first president to write a best seller?
Who was the only president to remain a bachelor throughout his life?
Who was the first divorced president? (Should be another easy one.)
What president had the most children?
Who was the first president to ascend to the presidency from the vice presidency upon the death of the president?
Who was the first president to have impeachment charges filed against him?
Who was the only president to commit treason against the United States?
And now, a question of great national significance. What president installed the first bathtub in the White House?
Who was the first president born in a hospital?
What presidents attended military academies?
Who was the last president not to have a college degree?
A final question with significance to current events. Who was the only president to have completely paid off the national debt during a period of his administration. I don’t mean balance the budget; I mean zero national debt.

ANSWERS

Abraham Lincoln was the first president to have a full beard while in office.
Benjamin Harrison was the last president to have a full beard throughout his term of office. However, there is a slight trick to this question. Harry Truman, during a vacation in 1948, briefly sported a goatee. However, it was gone by the time he returned to Washington.
Rutherford B. Hayes had the first telephone installed in the White House. Not only did he have it installed, he was so fascinated by it he frequently answered it himself.
Both Ulysses S. Grant and Harry S. Truman had S for a middle name. However, the story behind the S is significantly different. Grant was born Hiram Ulysses Grant. The congressman who signed his recommendation for West Point mistakenly listed his name as Ulysses S. Grant. Grant never disputed it and retained the S throughout his life. Biographers have reported that this was because he did not like the initials that spelled HUG. The rumor spread that the S stood for Simpson, his mother’s maiden name, but it never really stood for anything. Harry Truman’s middle name at birth was S. Both his maternal and paternal grandfathers had names that began with S and a significant family conflict arose about who he would be named after. The compromise was the initial.
Although it is widely believed that Teddy Roosevelt established the first National Park, it was Ulysses S. Grant who signed the legislation creating Yellowstone. The National Park Service was created by legislation signed by Woodrow Wilson.
The first US president to serve in the Navy was John F. Kennedy. Interestingly, the next four presidents also served in the Navy, three of them in World War Two.
Teddy Roosevelt was a best-selling author before he became president. He wrote histories, biographies, essays, and memoirs. His books were widely distributed and very popular. And this was in the era before presidents “wrote” their memoirs as a way of supplementing their post presidential income.
This was our mystery man, James Buchanan who never married.
The first man elected president who had previously been divorced was Ronald Reagan.
John Tyler had 15 children with two wives.
Once again, John Tyler. He was elected as vice president with William Henry Harrison. He became president when Harrison died shortly after assuming office. At the time, no one was sure if the vice president would become president or simply assume the duties. Tyler solved the problem by quickly having himself administered the oath of office. Tyler was never popular with his party and was referred to as “His Accidency”. He was not nominated for an independent term of office and left after his first term.
This is one The Grumpy Doc missed. I thought it would be Andrew Johnson. But, once again it was John Tyler. The charges were not successful, although surprisingly they were brought by his own party, and he completed the term.
You may have noticed a trend here; this was our old friend John Tyler. He was elected to the Confederate House of Representatives but died before actually taking office.
The first permanently installed bathtub was during the administration of Millard Fillmore. This may be the most significant thing that happened during the administration of this otherwise undistinguished president.
Jimmy Carter, born in 1924, was the first president born in a hospital.
Both President Grant and President Eisenhower graduated from the U. S. Military Academy at West Point and President Carter graduated from the U. S. Naval Academy at Annapolis.
President Truman was the last president without a college degree. He attended business school and law school but did not graduate from either. At that time, it was possible to attend law school without an undergraduate degree.
Andrew Jackson achieved his campaign promise of completely paying off the national debt on January 8th, 1835. However, this proved not to be a good thing. The practices he implemented to pay off the debt led directly to the panic of 1837, one of the worst recessions in U.S. history and a significant increase in national debt.

There is a lot more presidential trivia, but this is enough for our first go around. Please send me comments about your success in answering these questions. My score was right around 70%. Hopefully some of you can do better. But of course, if you do, The Grumpy Doc will never admit to having been beaten.

The Best President Ever

By John Turley

On May 16, 2023

In Commentary, History

As we get closer to the upcoming presidential election, I’m looking forward to the latest round of articles about “the best president ever”. These lists usually include Abraham Lincoln, FDR and Thomas Jefferson somewhere in the top three or four depending on where in the cycle of historic popularity their reputations happen to be. Other presidents such as Teddy Roosevelt, Wilson, Truman, Eisenhower and Reagan will go on and off the list depending on the whims and the political orientations of the list makers. JFK has occasionally been on the list of best presidents since shortly after his assassination. The more recent a president, the more likely he is to show up on these lists. This is due partly to the fact that we tend to give higher regard to those things about which we have firsthand knowledge. Any list done over the last 15 to 20 years may include Clinton or Obama or Trump, although, given the polarization of the political process today it’s unlikely that all three would be on the same list.

But what exactly does “best president” mean? How would you come up with quantitative measures that can be used to grade presidents and create a reproducible list? Of course, being “best “ largely depends on the severity of the problems faced by the president and the success of his solutions. It also seems to me that all such lists must be subjective and influenced by the political ideology, social position, financial status, education, and region of the country of the list maker. Personally, I don’t know how to even begin to rate a best president.

While I may not know who the best president was, I strongly believe I can tell you who the most important president was and always will be, that is George Washington. To borrow a phrase from historian James Flexner, Washington was the indispensable man. He had the combination of experience, strength and dignity that was necessary to guide this country through those first critical years. Without his initial leadership it’s possible that the country may have disintegrated it into several smaller bickering independent states that likely would have been annexed by the European powers. George Washington is the man who turned These United States with an emphasis on States into The United States with an emphasis on United.

George Washington’s importance began before there was a presidency or even a formal government. Without his leadership as the commanding general of the Continental Army there likely never would have been a United States at all.

Washington was never a great tactical general. He had very few battlefield victories, although his victories at Trenton and Princeton came at an important time for the fledgling revolution. They might even be considered strategic victories and it was his role as a strategic general that led to eventual victory.

Washington recognized that he did not have to win on the battlefield but only had to maintain the Continental Army as a field force and outlast the British will to conduct an overseas war. At a time when others were urging him to meet the British in a large European style battle, he recognized that losing decisively on a battlefield may have been enough to shatter the Continental Army and with it the entire Revolution. If you are not familiar with the many attempts early in the Revolutionary War to oust Washington from command, it will be well worth your time to read more about it.

At the end of the Revolution, Washington returned his Commission to the Continental Congress and retired to Mount Vernon. He expected to spend the rest of his days managing his estates. But his country was not yet done with him.

After the Revolution, the country was governed under the Articles of Confederation, a document that Washington called …” a rope of sand.” Multiple attempts were made to revise the articles, including a failed convention in Annapolis in 1786, to which only five states sent representatives.

When another convention was called in Philadelphia in 1787, Washington initially declined to participate, believing it would be no more successful than the Annapolis convention had been. Finally, James Madison and Henry Knox persuaded him to attend.

Washington arrived in Philadelphia and was promptly elected president of the convention. It was his presence that largely influenced every state except Rhode Island to send delegates. His presence also emboldened the delegates to embark on the creation of a new Constitution, rather than a simple revision of the articles as they had been tasked by their states.

As president of the convention, Washington maintained a non-partisan role. He seldom participated in debate and generally joined in the voting without comment. He felt it was his role to maintain the decorum of the convention, something he could do only by remaining above the fray.

Currently, there is much debate about the three-fifths clause and the role of slavery in the shaping of the Constitution. At the time, this was not the only contentious issue being debated. The role of a chief executive had the potential to be equally divisive.

Having just fought a revolution against a monarchy, many of the delegates had a strong distrust of centralized power. An initial proposal was to place executive power in a three man board. Prolonged discussion revolved around how to choose the board and how it would function. As it became clear that Washington could be the first president under a new constitution, support solidified behind the single chief executive. Without his presence, there may never have been a presidency at all.

Much has been made about the role of the Federalist Papers in the ratification of the Constitution. While they undoubtedly influenced the wealthy and the well-educated, the knowledge that Washington supported the Constitution and would be, without doubt, the first president was more important to the average citizen.

Washington was so popular at the time that some even suggested he be made “King of America”; an idea he would never even acknowledge.

In sum, even before he took the oath of office, George Washington was indeed our most important president.

Further reading:
Washington: A Life, Ron Chernow.

George Washington: The Political Rise of America’s Founding Father, David O. Stewart.

Washington: The Indispensable Man, James Thomas Flexnor.

George Washington’s Journey: The President Forges a New Nation, T. H. Breen.

The Summer of 1787: The Men Who Invented the Constitution, David O. Stewart.

George Washington: A Biography, Douglas Southall Freeman. This seven-volume set is the gold standard of Washington biographies.

The Contradictory Life of Thomas Jefferson

By John Turley

On March 18, 2023

In Commentary, History

Part I, Liberty and Slavery

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

These stirring words that Thomas Jefferson used in the Declaration of Independence put forth a clear statement of his political philosophy. Unfortunately, the man behind the words is not nearly so self-evident. To borrow a phrase from Winston Churchill, he is a riddle wrapped in a mystery, wrapped in an enigma. Biographer Joseph Ellis referred to him as The American Sphinx.

He was a man of the enlightenment, but he was also a man clearly bound to the brutal slave economy. He dreamed of a bucolic America peopled by hardworking yeoman farmers while he lived the life of a wealthy British aristocrat. He abhorred the thought of banks and bankers but spent his entire life mired in debt. He wrote and spoke often of the need to avoid factionalism in politics but was a skillful practitioner of political intrigue. He constantly argued against expansion of governmental power but as President, without having the authority, he undertook to expand the United States to more than double its size.

So, how do we reconcile the words with the man? Perhaps we don’t. Perhaps the best we can do is try to understand the world in which he lived and the circumstances that led him to take such contradictory positions in his political and personal life. Tens of thousands of pages have been written trying to understand and explain Thomas Jefferson. Now, I’m only going to look briefly at his relationship to slavery. In a later post I’ll be looking at Thomas Jefferson as the master of political manipulation.

Of the many contradictions in Thomas Jefferson’s life, his relationship to slavery is the most difficult to reconcile. One of his first cases after becoming a lawyer was to represent a slave seeking his freedom on the grounds that his grandmother was a mulatto which would require him to be in bondage only until age 31. In an argument to the Virginia court Jefferson said, “Everyone comes into this world with the right to his own person, this is what is called personal liberty and is given them by the author of nature, under the law we are all born free.”

Both the judge and the jury were outraged that Jefferson would propose freeing a slave. The judge refused to hear any further such talk and ruled against Jefferson’s client. According to historian Winston Groom the fact that Jefferson had such a position at that time (1770) is considered significant and was a milestone in the evolution of his thought.

About that same time Jefferson was elected to the House of Burgesses and he introduced an act that would allow masters to govern emancipation of their slaves rather than having to seek the permission of the courts and the royal officers. This was met with strong opposition and did not pass. It is significant that Jefferson did not pursue either the court case or the legislation.

As a member of the Continental Congress, Jefferson prepared an amendment to the Ordinance of 1784 (a precursor to the Northwest Ordinance) stipulating the freedom of all children born to slaves after a certain date but requiring that they be deported to either the Caribbean or Africa. This amendment failed by a single vote in Congress. Reflecting on the decision Jefferson wrote: “Thus we see the fate of millions unborn hanging on the tongue of one man and heaven was silent in that awful moment”. But Jefferson was to remain silent as well!

To Jefferson it was unimaginable that free whites and free blacks could live together peaceably. Even years later when writing about it he said that it was “inconceivable [then] that the public mind would bear this proposition, nor will it bear at this day”. He also wrote “Yet the day is not distant when it must bear and adopt it or worse will follow, nothing is more surely written in the book of fate than that these people are to be free.” According to Jefferson’s biographer Jon Meacham, he was never able to move public opinion on slavery and his powers failed him and they failed America.

As president, Jefferson signed a law making it a crime to import slaves. But at the same time, he believed that if slaves were set free, they must be deported to Africa or the Caribbean. Most of his contemporaries agreed; they felt that American slavery was equivalent to “holding the ear of a tiger”, but they saw no way to let go.

So again, we return to the question of how to reconcile Jefferson the philosopher with Jefferson the enslaver. Jefferson was a man who enjoyed luxury and the finer things in life. Today he is viewed as a wealthy planter. However, he was what we would now consider cash poor. All his wealth was tied up in property and his slaves were a large portion of that property. His land was heavily mortgaged, and his slaves were his collateral. Jefferson’s wife was the daughter of a wealthy man and when her father died Jefferson inherited his 135 slaves and his land, which was also heavily mortgaged. He also inherited his father-in-law’s other considerable debts. He worried constantly about his financial status, yet he could not control his lavish spending. Freeing his slaves would have lost him the collateral against which his many loans were guaranteed.

Jefferson recognized the evil of slavery but also benefited greatly from it. He was unable to give up his comfortable life even while bemoaning the institution which made it possible. His relationship with Sally Hemmings has been a subject of much debate and is beyond what I can address here but if you are familiar with her story, you know that this a singular example of Jefferson’s inability to subordinate his desires to his principles.

During his lifetime he freed only two of his slaves and in his will, he freed only an additional three. This compares to some other founders who freed all their slaves in their wills. Perhaps he recognized that freeing his slaves would have resulted in an immediate foreclosure on his beloved Monticello.

It is long been axiomatic among historians that people should be judged by the time in which they lived. Jefferson was a man of his times, an exceptional man without doubt. However, his was a time that was consumed by one of the great evils of history. And that evil will always reflect on his memory. Each of us will have to make our own decision about Thomas Jefferson.

My Journey into Genealogy

By John Turley

On March 6, 2023

In Appalachia, Commentary, History

My journey into genealogy began when I was in my early 60s, an age at which many people would already be calling me an ancestor. It’s not something I had ever been particularly interested in. I really had very little sense of my family history. At that time, I could name my grandparents and one of my great grandparents and the family name of some other great grandparents but little else. Of course, like everyone else, we all had our family lore such as the Cherokee Princess in the family but no real documentation of anything.

Margie’s first cousin Mary has been involved in the Daughters of the American Revolution for quite some time. She really encouraged Margie to become a member and in fact did her research and prepared her application. She asked me at the time if I had thought about joining the Sons of the American Revolution. I dismissed it as unlikely because another part of our family lore was that all our ancestors came over from Ireland during the potato famine of the mid-1800s. Like much family lore, this tended to have little basis in fact and the only ancestor I have been able to document as having arrived from Ireland in the mid-1800s was not a Turley but a Kanary, another name that I had never heard before I started my journey.

Margie’s other first cousin Barbie was also in the DAR and her husband Bob is in the SAR. Bob encouraged me to apply to the SAR, but I was convinced that there were no ancestors in my family who could trace back to the revolution. Bob said he would do the research for me if I wanted to join. My friend Dick also helped me start down this path.

Our mother had always said that she could have joined the DAR but never did. I always discounted this because she had several other family legends that she used to tell us. One of those legends was that we were related to Teddy Roosevelt. This was because her grandmother’s family name was Bullock and Teddy Roosevelt’s mother’s family name was Bulloch. I always felt this was highly unlikely for two reasons, first because the spelling was different but mostly because our Bullock ancestors were New Jersey Quaker farmers and Teddy’s ancestors were wealthy southern planters. However, despite the fact we weren’t related to Teddy, I was surprised to discover we had many ancestors who traced back to the revolutionary era on both sides of the family.

Bob did his research and found my ancestor with ties to the revolution. His name was Samuel Henry, yet another ancestor I had never been aware of. His support for the revolution came in the form of what is called patriotic public service. He served on a grand jury that was called into session by the revolutionary government of Virginia in defiance of the crown.

This got me interested in seeing if I had any other revolutionary ancestors. In specific, as a former Marine, I was looking for somebody with more manly service than a grand jury. I found my man, a Massachusetts farmer named Moses Nash who served in the Massachusetts militia as a Minuteman Lieutenant and my fourth great grandfather. Not one of the Lexington and Concord Minutemen, but a Minuteman, nonetheless. Well now I was on a roll. I thought if there are two, there must be more. My current count is eight ancestors whose service I have documented and another 19 who were living in the colonies during the revolution but for whom I have not yet documented service,

I had no idea that my family can be traced so far back into the United States. Specifically, I had no idea that a significant branch of my family has ties to colonial New England in Massachusetts, Vermont, and Connecticut. One branch of my family I have traced back to the 1620s in Massachusetts. It was fascinating to read the will of an ancestor who died in 1638. I’m now on the hunt for the Holy Grail of American genealogy, a Mayflower ancestor. Although it’s highly unlikely, it’s still an interesting search.

I did try to discover that Cherokee Princess. I found a handwritten family history that said my second great grandmother’s grandmother was a Cherokee. Why it was listed that way rather than naming her I’m not sure. I have done some research and I have not been able to document any Cherokees in her lineage unless they were named Adkins or Midkiff or Gillespie, none of which I believe are Indian names.

DNA testing has also failed to document any Native American heritage. Although after that many generations that is not completely exclusionary. The person in question is my fourth great grandmother and on average I have inherited only 1/64 of my DNA from her. It is possible that specific Native American markers were not included in that small segment of DNA I inherited. But when the lack of DNA evidence is added to the lack documentary evidence, I have to admit that I’m not descended from a Cherokee Princess. (By the way, I’ve always wondered why it’s never a Cherokee Prince.)

So how did those ancestors get from New England to West Virginia? Right after the revolution the new United States government was almost broke. Many revolutionary soldiers were paid with a land warrant giving them a grant on the western frontier. They moved from New England and the eastern seaboard states into Ohio, western Virginia, Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, and Tennessee. Generally, the lower the rank of the soldier the further West and the smaller his land warrant. But for men with no opportunity to own their own farms in the crowded eastern colonies, this was an opportunity they could not resist.

I have discovered a lot of things commonly believed about genealogy that appear to largely be mythology. There’s the story that the family’s name was changed at Ellis Island. If the family’s name was changed, either they did it themselves to appear more American or it was done on board ship before they arrived. At Ellis Island, ship manifests were copied into the arrival journal and no additional individual information was taken from the immigrants beyond a health examination and identification of a sponsor who would be responsible for them. Occasionally names may have been inadvertently changed later by a census taker who misunderstood or couldn’t spell ethnic names.

There’s also the “three brothers” story. This is a story where three brothers arrived from Ireland, England, Germany, take your choice, and then went to three different areas and that’s why there is significant name distribution. In fact, almost always when family members immigrated together, they tended to stay together as they moved further into the United States. DNA studies have demonstrated that most of the widely distributed name clusters have little close relationship.

If you want to find a quick and easy source of information about your family history, go to any of the major genealogy websites and look at census records. Depending on the year of the census you can find where your ancestors were born, if they could read or write, where their parents were born and what occupations they followed. It’s also surprising how large the families were. If you look at surrounding families, you can see that there are many clusters of relatives in the rural areas. Once they’ve moved into the cities they tend to be less often grouped together.

My favorite website is ancestry.com, but any of the major websites will have fascinating information. Just don’t accept everything on those web sites as factual. I have found many of the relationships listed to actually be an unrelated person of the same name. For example, in the early 1800s there were four John Turley’s in the Kanawha County area. Middle names weren’t common then and it took some research to figure out which one was my third great grandfather.

If you’re interested in genealogy, just get in touch with The Grumpy Doc and I’ll be glad to help you on your journey. Who knows, maybe we’re cousins.

Anchors Aweigh, Part IV

By John Turley

On February 7, 2023

In History, Medicine, Travel

I reported on board the USS Sanctuary in September of 1969 and went to the personnel office for my assignment. This won’t surprise anyone who was ever in the Navy, but they seemed to have no idea that I was coming. After conferring among themselves, they came back and told me that I would be senior corpsman in sterile surgical supply.

Sterile surgical supply was where we prepared and maintained all the equipment necessary for conducting surgery as well as the sterile equipment used in the clinics and wards. The Sanctuary had several surgical suites that were busy almost all the time when we were on station in support of combat operations. It was a busy place and went through a lot of equipment.

Life on board a Navy ship is a 24 hour a day, seven day a week job. There are no days off when you’re at sea. Fortunately, as a member of the hospital crew, I was what they called a shift worker. Which meant I had a set schedule. Members of the ship’s crew were watch standers. That meant they worked in four hour rotations that changed every 24 hours. We could at least have some type of a routine for awake and sleep time, but for a watch stander the schedule was constantly rotating. As a petty officer and a supervisor, I was exempt from some extracurricular duties such as working on the mess decks and taking part in working parties for regular ship maintenance and supply.

The work was hard and continuous. There was no shortage of casualties in 1969. Our job was to provide direct medical support to our troops in combat. The wounded were flown by helicopter directly from the battlefield to the ship. We got the most severely injured; the ones who couldn’t be effectively treated at a field hospital.

The crew was highly trained and incredibly efficient. From the time a wounded soldier or marine landed on our flight deck it was only minutes until he was in the operating room. The survival rate for the wounded in Vietnam was far greater than it had been in either World War II or Korea. This was largely due to the speed with which casualties were transported to definitive medical care.

We generally didn’t treat civilians, but one day, unbeknownst to us, one of our medevac helicopters was bringing in a pregnant Vietnamese woman. When she was offloaded on the flight deck she was already in labor. They brought her down to the preoperative holding area which was adjacent to our sterile supply room. When there was a heavy influx of casualties, we helped out in the preop area that functioned somewhat like an emergency room.

We were standing there, an anesthesiologist and three corpsmen, trying to figure out how to deliver a baby. Thank goodness the woman took it in her own hands and delivered the baby herself! Of course, that didn’t stop us from congratulating each other about delivering the only baby born on a Navy hospital ship during the Vietnam War. If only all our patients could have turned out so well.

When I remember my time on the Sanctuary, I try not to dwell on the suffering of our patients. Their sacrifices still move me to tears. I prefer to be grateful that I was mostly out of direct combat and to focus the less intense episode that helped us maintain our sanity.

One unexpected benefit of being the senior corpsman in sterile surgical supply was being able to order those supplies. One day while going through the supply catalog I discovered it was possible to order five gallons of pure medical grade grain alcohol. And even better, it required no approval. I also ordered a large five gallon glass beaker. We had wall mounts in our work room where there were glass beakers with soap solution and acetone. We also had an empty wall mount.

The alcohol arrived, along with the five-gallon beaker. I put the alcohol in the beaker and pasted a large poison sign on it. I got green food coloring from the mess decks in return for a promise to share. It’s easy to be generous when you have five gallons. I did have to emphasize that it couldn’t be drunk straight but had to be diluted by fifty percent with fruit juice or soda.

The food coloring gave it an appropriately poisonous appearance. It also gave us the advantage of hiding it in plain sight. I quickly became the most popular corpsman on the ship.

Right after Thanksgiving the CO of the ship issued an announcement that the crew was now authorized to put up Christmas decorations. (I think I’ve mentioned before that sometimes I don’t always think through my wise cracks.) The fact that we were now authorized to have Christmas got me thinking. I made a large sign that said “All enlisted personnel desiring to have a Merry Christmas must report to the ship’s office to obtain a Christmas chit. Personnel having a Merry Christmas without an appropriate chit will be subject to nonjudicial punishment.” A chit was basically the Navy’s version of a permission slip. I thought this was pretty funny. Apparently, the ship’s office did not agree when people started lining up to get their Christmas chits.

This resulted in a stern lecture from our leading chief. It generally consisted of about every third word beginning with the letter F. I was sure I was going to be reassigned, reduced in rank, sent to the brig or something even worse. Surprisingly, after many blistering words, he dismissed me with a wave of the hand. As I was leaving, much relieved, the chief said, “And you can drop off the rest of that grain you got to the chief’s mess .” That depleted my supply and ended my short-lived popularity on the USS Sanctuary.

Right after Christmas, we had the opportunity to have a Bob Hope show on board the ship. Everyone was crammed onto the main deck to watch Bob, a few musicians and some dancers put on about an hour and a half show. I was way in the back as we had all the patients in the front. Bob’s jokes were corny. I’m sure the dancers were pretty (I wasn’t close enough to tell for sure) and the musicians weren’t particularly talented, but a good time was had by all.

Navy ships at sea in a combat zone practice strict blackout at night. Hospital ships don’t. Not only are they painted white, but they are lit up like a cruise ship with large flood lights hanging over the side of the ship to illuminate the red crosses. This illumination led to what quickly became one of our favorite pastimes.

Inshore ocean waters in Southeast Asia are infested with sea snakes and they are attracted to light. One sailor had his parents send him a sling shot and BBs and before long the ship’s rails were lined with sailors firing BBs and watching the snakes rolling in the water. For most of us, these were the only shots we fired in Viet Nam.

Once, while cruising close to the mouth of the Perfume River near Hue City, the ship went dead in the water. The rumor quickly spread among the crew that the NVA had attached a mine to the hull. Everyone rushed on deck to watch as divers went over the side to investigate. Imagine our disappointment when they surfaced dragging a large fishing net that had wrapped around the propeller.

I don’t remember as much about the trip home from Vietnam as I do about the plane ride over. I do remember that as soon as the plane lifted off the ground everyone on board started cheering and applauding and whiskey bottles were passed up and down the aisles. (Perhaps that’s why I don’t remember much about the flight.) Needless to say, it was a very happy trip.

There were other events that I may share at some point, including a misguided trip to Camp Eagle and several port calls to the infamous Olongapo in the Philippines. However, this post has gone on long enough, but I may return later to revisit these memories.

We arrived at Norton Air Force Base, which I now knew was in Ontario, California, not Ontario, Canada. They took us through customs and started searching our bags. I was wondering why, because I couldn’t imagine anything we could possibly be bringing back that would be valuable enough for customs to worry about until I saw them going through bags and pulling out weapons, grenades and even a mortar shell.

This was in the spring of 1970 and the height of the Vietnam War protests. As soon as we cleared customs, they put us in a large auditorium and gave us our welcome home briefing. One of the few things I remember from this is that we were told that if we did not have civilian clothes that we should go to the base exchange buy some and put them on before we got to LAX. Under no circumstances should we go to LAX in uniform because we would be harassed or possibly even assaulted by protesters. This was not quite the welcome home any of us were expecting.

I was on my way to an officer training program and four years in college. I was sure that by the time I graduated and got commissioned the war in Vietnam would be over. But, like many things associated with that war, nothing would ever be certain, and I would see that sad country again.