Arnold D. Langmaid, Danville’s oldest man number two
On Wednesday, March 27, 2013, the Society awarded the second oldest man living in Danville award to Arnold D. Langmaid of North Danville. He is our number two oldest, because…
Dec 1862–A Resurrected Peninsula Campaign Suffers a Bloody Death
By Gary Farrow, Danville Historical Society
With the armies expected to shut down for the winter, December was anticipated to be a quiet month, but Lincoln had other ideas.
December 20, 1862 North Star–The War
The Battle of Fredericksburg
Our war news this week is of the most exciting character — of a nature calculated to painfully interest the public. Great events have transpired at Fredericksburg. Again have the Union forces met the enemy, have fought severe and bloody engagements, and again has that enemy been found too strongly posted to be overcome… The preliminary shelling and occupation of Fredericksburg by our troops appeared to be a success. So was the crossing of the Rappahannock in the face and eyes of a deadly foe — that was one of the most daring military exploits on record.
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The Federals were slaughtered. One of the most one-sided battles of the American Civil War was fought by General Robert E. Lee’s Confederate Army of North Virginia and the Army of the Potomac, now commanded Major General Ambrose E. Burnside. It was waged over five mild days in mid-December. The Union troops initially took Fredericksburg with only token resistance from the Grays. The city had been evacuated prior to the commencement of serious bombardment. The rebels waited and fortified their positions in the Marye’s Heights behind the town.
Nov 1862–America’s Little Napoleon Meets His Waterloo
By Gary Farrow, Danville Historical Society
November 15, 1862 North Star–Removal of Gen. McClellan
The latest military change is the removal of Gen. McClellan from the army of the Potomac, and the appointment of Gen. Burnside in his stead. The order was delivered last week Friday night; and it took the army by surprise. He was relieved of his command and ordered to report himself at Trenton N.J., where his family now is. His last official act was the issuing of an address to his soldiers informing them in a few words that the command had devolved on Gen. Burnside and took affectionate leave of them. He immediately departed for Trenton.
This change will perhaps take many of our readers by surprise. It is claimed to have been a military necessity, which means we suppose that the best good of the army and its future success, required the change. If this is true, and the only motive for removal, no one should complain, for it is no worse for Gen. McClellan to be superseded for these important reasons, than for many other military officers, who have shared the same fate.
Everything should yield to military success and fitness for the place, so far as army appointments are concerned, not withstanding many of these offices have been and still are, conferred as a matter of favoritism, rather than merit. Gen McClellan, we have believed, to be an able General — a man of sterling personal probity, and unwavering loyalty. And while he has, as we believe tried to do his work conscientiously and surely, in meeting the enemy in front, almost from first to last, he has had enemies in his rear, who have tried to thwart his plans and secure his downfall. There have been political, if not personal, plots and counterplots against him and although President Lincoln has not been engaged in them, but has always defended and sustained McClellan, yet his opponents have at last triumphed in his removal, and they are now glorifying the change.
We sincerely trust, that as a military measure, the removal may prove highly beneficial to the Federal cause and that the gallant General Burnside will secure speedy and brilliant success, and that the noble McClellan, whether he entirely retires from military life or accepts some other command, will live long enough to overcome those political and envious conspirators who have been instrumental in his removal.
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“Plots and counterplots” weren’t the half of it. As evidenced by the Civil War itself, the Republic was fragile, only some 85 years removed from the American Revolution. Today the notion that our military exists to serve civil authority is a bedrock assumption; one hundred and fifty years ago with the nation coming apart at the seams, the boundaries between civilian government and the military weren’t so clear.
Sep 1862–Lincoln’s Cockamamie Idea; Rebels at the Doorstep; the Constitution Takes a Beating
By Gary Farrow, Danville VT Historical Society
The times were very bleak indeed for the North: the President was flopping around on the race question; a shockingly swift military reversal had just occurred in the east; and the Federal government was fighting with the judiciary here in Vermont. Meanwhile, the Ninth Vermont suffered a reversal of fortune.
North Star–September 6, 1862
The President’s Colonization Scheme
Senator S. C. Pomeroy of Kansas by request of the President consented to organize emigration parties of free colored persons for settlement in South America and has been commissioned accordingly. This gentleman’s success in organizing “Emigrant Aid Expeditions” from Massachusetts for the purpose of getting control of Kansas for the Free Soilers is looked upon as an encouragement for the present scheme. The Government proposes to send the emigrants in good steamships and provide them with all the necessary implements of labor and also sustenance until they gather a harvest.
Senator Pomeroy’s address proposes to take with him on the first day of October next, 100 colored men, as pioneers in the movement with their families to Chirigui in New Granada [Nicaragua], if the place on examination is found satisfactory and promising. He desires all persons of the African race, of sound health, who desire to go, to send him at Washington their names, sex, age, numbers and post office address… He wants mechanics and laborers, earnest and sober men, for the interests of a generation, if may be, are involved in the success of this experiment, and with the approbation of the American people and under the blessing of God it cannot fail.
Raising Israel Randall
Local historian conjectures a life not found in the history book
By Sharon Lakey
“The ideal historian goes to the mouth of the tomb, cries: “Lazarus, come forth!” and sets him that was dead for ages, blinking and passionate, in the sun.”
AUSTIN O’MALLEY, Keystones of Thought
Lance Comfort’s Lazarus is Israel Randall of North Danville, and his attempt to raise him started with a deed he bought on Ebay.
The deed, a time-weathered document, begins with “Know all men by these presents that I Jesse Leavenworth of Danville in the County of Orange and State of Vermont for and in consideration of the sum of thirty pounds lawful money to men in hand paid before the delivery hereof by Israel Randal of Danville…” The deed is dated November 30, 1791.
With deed in hand, Lance began his own historical mystery tour with a series of questions that developed into a conjectured understanding of Israel Randall’s life in Danville. “History is written by the survivors, the winners, those who passed their history forward. If a family didn’t stick around, they do not appear in the history book,” said Lance, pointing to Village in the Hills a history of Danville, Vermont that lay on the table in front of us. A quick check of the index in the book shows no Israel Randall.
However, Randall’s name does appear once in the book—page 24 on the map that is captioned: “Final division of land under Danville’s second charter in 1802 following settlement with New York for ’30,000 rights.’” There, in the tiniest of print, is a plot without a number reading “200A Israel Randall.” The first town charter was granted under New York with the name of Hillsborough; the second charter was granted under Vermont with the name Danville. Village in the Hills describes this confusing process in detail in chapter two. It was a process that Lance believes affected Randall as well as and other earlier settlers. Could Randall have settled first under the Hillsborough charter, then later be made to comply with the second? Lance believes this is likely.
Link to new Thaddeus Stevens video
To view a short historical video on the Caledonia Iron works in Pennsylvania, which was owned by Thaddeus Stevens, click on this here
Newsletter, January 2012
This month's newsletter focuses on what the Historical Society accomplished during 2011 with parting words from Paul Chouinard, who will be stepping down in March from the presidency. Three elected…
Janet’s new calendar
A Local's Perspective By Sharon Lakey Last year, Janet Carson, one of Danville's excellent photographers, put out her first calendar. For everyone that was lucky enough to get one, they…