William J. Wilson to Frederick Douglass, September 6, 1865
Washington, D.C. 6 Sept[ember] 1865.
FREDERICK DOUGLASS, ESQ.
DEAR SIR:
In reply to your letter,1The letter Douglass sent to William J. Wilson, dated 8 August 1865, is printed earlier in this volume. I must say, I am quite surprised at its tone. So will
everybody else be, especially when they read in connexion with it, an ex-
tract from a published letter of yours, in answer to an invitation to be pres-
ent at the 4th of July celebration of the Lincoln Monument Association.2Although Wilson labels it the Lincoln Monument Association, it was officially the Colored People’s Educational Monument Association, for which he served as corresponding secretary. Douglass was invited to attend the group’s 1865 Fourth of July celebration in Washington, D.C., but did not attend. , 3, 5, 34.
The said extract reads thus: “Gentlemen, had your note come a few days
earlier I might have been able to mingle my voice, &c., &c. As the matter
now stands I can only send you the assurance that I shall be with you in
spirit and purpose.” So my dear sir, you were with the Association in spirit
and purpose on the 4th day of July, 1865, and you find yourself opposed to
the spirit and purpose of the Association on the 8th day of August, 1865.
One of those very sudden summersets not unusual, but as yet, I believe,
unaccountable to even your best friends.
But, then you have attempted to give some reasons for your present
position which perhaps may afford some temporary relief.
Let us give them a brief examination.
And first, you say you are not opposed to Monuments or colleges.
“Things good in standing alone are not always, good when mixed.”
If their ever was expressed upon paper a sentiment more copperish3Alluding to the racism of contemporary Northern Democrats, or “Copperheads.” than this, I have yet to see it. It seems as though it was clipped directly
from the genuine negro haters’ prejudice monger’s creed.
I do not say that you so clipped this sentiment from their creed. Do
not misunderstand me; but to hear my friend F.D., who has all his life long
been engaged in mixing, now expressing his detestation of the thing when
wholly practicable, is a little too much.
Only think of it; Frederick Douglass will not support or favor the
erection of a Monument with the money of the American people—a free
gift—if the conception—the plan emanate from colored men, and its erec-
tion be under the auspices of colored men. He is indeed opposed to mix-
ing; mixing our white friends money with our own; for he distinctly says.
“Now a monument by the colored people, erected at the expense of the
colored people, I can appreciate; and whenever a movement shall be made
for such a Monument, I am with it, heart and soul.” Strange language
this for F.D., the head and front of whose offending has been “trying [to]
mix[.]” A company of colored men propose to erect in Washington, in
memory of our lamented President, a monument, and will accept contributions from their friends and the friends of that good man everywhere to
that end. Now are these men to be told by Mr. Douglass at this day, that
they must look into the faces of the contributors to spy out the complexion
of each, and reject all proffers from those they find to be white?
Mr. Douglass says “‘when he goes for anything, he likes to go it
strong.” Truly in his own language “this is going it strong” against mix-
ing; and yet it does sound a little odd coming from him, and the general
public will so regard it.
But Mr. Douglass says “It can not be a colored peoples’ monument if
white friends contribute.”
We did think and still hold, and defy Mr. Douglass to show to the
contrary, that if we conceive a monument ought to be erected, conceive a
plan, collect and are the sole custodians of the means, and projectors of the work, it is a Colored People’s Monument, if we see fit to so denominate it; as much so, as the beautiful Methodist Church opposite our office window is a Methodist Church, notwithstanding many well-wishers either of progress or religion contributed to its erection.4The Colored People’s Educational Monument Association’s office was located at 201 G Street in Washington, D.C. The Methodist church that Wilson refers to is most likely the East Washington Station Church of the Colored Methodist Episcopal Church. According to an 1864 city directory, the church’s address was East 4th Street between South G Street and South Carolina Avenue, in the southern part of the city, which would place it in proximity to the association’s office. Boyd’s Washington and Georgetown Directory, 87; Celebration by the Colored People’s Educational Monument
Association, 34.
And we desire to say, we could erect no monument to the memory of
the lamented dead whose purpose and spirit were in any sense more dis-
tinctive than this. To do so would be in our opinion an act of injustice to
ourselves and to the memory of our lamented President. We would make
no war upon Mr. Douglass, nor any one else who would erect what he
considers a purely Colored Monument, but for ourselves, we would mix
and mingle all the contributions of the kindly disposed towards carrying
out of the great work of elevating the American People and remembering
the great dead, though the projectors are colored men. But Mr. Douglass
not only denies the propriety of the American People placing into the
custody of colored men money to erect a monument to Mr. Lincoln, but
he decidedly objects to the propriety of the monument taking the form of
a College. “It may be permanent” he says. This is his great fear, of course,
he would have white men build colleges whenever and wherever needed;
and have no fear on account of their permanency and we fail to see why
any other person seeing its need, may not do the same thing irrespective
of color without raising Mr. Douglass’ dread of permanency.
Mr. Douglass says “ I am in favor of all needful educational institu-
tions for the present education of colored people though they be separate
institutions. Present circumstances are the only apology for such Institu-
tions," “When a colored girl or boy can go to school or college with the
white people of the country it is best for all they should do so.” Agreed—But I go beyond Mr. Douglass and say, when a white girl or boy can go to
school or college with the children of the country without regard to com-
plexion it is better far better. The college we propose hath this extent;—no
more; perfect equality; and full freedom for all who are worthy.
“But says Mr. Douglass I am not for upbuilding permanent separate Institutions for colored people;” and yet in this same letter he tells us that “he goes it strong against mixing, and that therefore the only monument
he will support, heart and soul, must be purely and distinctly a Colored
Monument, done up only, and in every sense by colored people;” said
monument; to be of course as permanent as the hills upon which it shall
stand. We have read somewhere of a boy who jumped into a brier bush and
scratched out both his eyes; and jumped into the brier bush and scratched
them in again. But he was a boy.—But I could for the credit of manhood
have wished my friend might have kept the possession of his, at least to
the end of the chapter.
He would not have us build this College here for fear it will be a per-
manent separate concern. I would remind him if he does not know, that
colored people in these regions are numerous, and as active as they are
numerous.5Wilson is presumably referring to the number of blacks in the District of Columbia, where the Colored People’s Educational Monument Association proposed to establish its school. In the city of Washington proper, the number of blacks tripled between 1860 and 1870, from 10,983 to 35,455. In the remaining areas of the District of Columbia, including Georgetown, the black population in 1860 was about 3,333, compared to 7,949 in 1870. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Report on Population of the United States at the Ninth Census: 1870, 97; Lois E. Horton, “The Days of Jubilee: Black Migration during the Civil War and Reconstruction,” in Urban Odyssey: A Multicultural History of Washington, D.C., ed. Francine Curro Cary (Washington, D.C., 1996), 67, 71; Williams, “A Blueprint for Change,” 371.
I am not sure that anymore, if as much can be said of the aggregate of the whites about here; and hence is demanded for these colored
persons greater educational facilities. Shall we have them or shall we sit
down and wait for our white neighbors till they provide them expressly for
themselves and then edge our way in, if we can? I would plainly remind
Mr. Douglass, that if we would do our part in learning the American peo-
ple those lessons of equal manhood he speaks of, we shall have to origi-
nate as well as imitate; lead as well as follow; conceive, plan and erect
Monuments and build Colleges as well as with hats in hand go continually
knocking at the doors by others;—we shall have to do these things even
though we may not know the exact complexion of the friends who may
see fit to make us the custodians of the means with which to build them.
When we shall boldly do these things, then shall we be able to enjoy with
our white neighbors that equal freedom he seems to so devoutly long for.
Then shall we vote with them at the same ballot box; sit with them
in the same jury box; use the same cartridge box; travel with them in the
same rail car; and be alike proud of the same country; and to fight alike
the same foe; advantages certainly of which none seem to have a clearer
perception than Mr. Douglass; but from which I can logically see why he has yet realized so little.
He has been over spending his strength in knocking at his white
neighbors door for permission to come in to (his) the white neighbor’s
feast, rather than garnishing his own castle and spreiding his own table,
and inviting his white neighbor to (his) Frederick Douglass’ repast. Men
acknowledge the equality of those only who show ability to do the same
things they do, and though late I think Mr. Douglass has yet to learn this lesson.
He says he “would not at this late day relinquish these long cherished sentiments; now that light is beginning to break.” I would not have him do so. I would only, now that it is well nigh day, change his dreams or visions to realities.
If Mr. Douglass will take the pains to look over the list of the managers of the Lincoln Monument Association he will find that they are a little
mixed; being partly colored gentlemen and partly white gentlemen;6While black leaders served as the principal officers of the Colored People’s Educational Monument Association, one list of directors and state representatives, published in the Philadelphia Christian Recorder, reveals that a few whites held honorary leadership roles within the organization. For example, Senator Charles Sumner, Gerrit Smith, and William Duane Wilson, a former editor of the Chicago Tribune, served as life directors. Philadelphia Christian Recorder, 15 July 1865; Celebration by the Colored People’s Educational Monument Association, 34.
only
by one of these changes I suppose, that these new times have thrown up to
the surface of human affairs the colored gentlemen are in the lead.
And from these latter first came the proposition to build a College
whose doors shall be open all. This may be an objection, but we do not so
regard it; nor till now did we suppose so firm a believer in true progress as
Mr. Douglass professed to be did.
But not satisfied with running a tilt against our Monument, and mak-
ing a dash into our College, our Quixotic7Wilson refers to the novel Don Quixote, by the Spanish author Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra in 1605. The main character, Quixote, is considered impulsive, idealistic, and obsessed with the romance of chivalry. Sancho Panza is Quixote’s servant turned squire. Wilson alludes to one of the most famous scenes in the book, in which Quixote and Sancho come upon a field of windmills. As part of the delusion that he is a knight-errant, Quixote see the windmills as giants and decides to fight them, despite Sancho’s warnings and protests. In a later chapter, Quixote imagines that the dust stirred up by a flock of sheep indicates the advance of an invading army. Sancho is again unsuccessful at puncturing his master’s illusion. Wilson seems to imply that Douglass is quixotic, perhaps irrational, and even delusional in thinking that the idea of a combined monument and school threatens the cause of education and equality for blacks. L. A. Murillo, A Critical Introduction to Don Quixote (New York, 1988), x, 1, 42, 58-59, 62; Anthony Close, A Companion to Don Quixote (Rochester, N.Y., 2008), 52, 90-91. friend breaks a lance against
the combination of Monument and College; and as he thinks razes them
to the ground, so thought he of whom he (Douglass) is a prototype, when
he dashed into the wind mills until the flock of sheep, against all remon-
strances of his man Sancho Panzo.
Hear Mr. Douglass. He says, “a monument is a monument and has
its own peculiar claims; but the two things are incongruous and offensive
when connected.” It does seem a little strange that one with Mr. Douglass’
sagacity should be betrayed into this error. That he should fail to see that
a monument is simply, and only a thing by which the memory of a person
or an event is preserved. It may be a building; it may be a stone; it may be
a combination of both; but it is a thing that reminds—that is all. This is
the plain definition; and to it I may add that which most continually and
most forcibly reminds is the highest and most noblest form of monument.
What peculiar claims, I would ask Mr. Douglass has a monument but to
keep foremost and sacredly in memory the leading traits;—feature;—or
idea of the individual or event it serves to commemorate? And if a Monu-
ment to Abraham Lincoln has any peculiar claim, it is to exhibit and keep
alive what was prominent in his great life; namely, the elevation of the
long oppressed in this land, and what better than a Memorial College,
carrying out what he in his lifetime had begun will accomplish this end?
Which then is preferable? Which shall we have? The mere cold stone
which the ignorant youth, beholding will scarcely be able to decypher the
meaning thereof and the future coming throng passing, will be too busy,
or too indifferent to appreciate, or a memorial of learning, whose light
shall [illumine] coming generations, and point the mind in its cultivated
state back to him of whom it is a perpetual tribute?
I leave an intelligent public to answer:—
But we weary as the reader also must, of following Mr. Douglass
through his various errors and fallacies. All his talk about the “scheme
being derogatory to our character” and about attempts to wash the Black
man’s face in the nation’s tears," “and about turning veneration into ad-
vantage, &c., &c.” is not deducible from anything expressed or implied,
o[r] contemplated by the Association; and (we hope we are mistaken,) it
does seem to contain an amount of virus that is strangely unaccountible.
Tull further light, therefore, I leave this portion of his theme, adding only,
that there are death of Mr. Lincoln—a nation’s tears;—and let them flow
as they ought;—but there is something more for his memory; and that is
the faithful carrying out of the great desire of his great heart—the desemi-
nation among all-classes of the American people, the great principles of
right and truth which underlie all equality and all true manhood.
The Lincoln Monument Association propose a Memorial College, for
the perpetual diffusion of these high and holy principles in the most cul-
tivated and broadest form attainable; because they are right and because
in their light Abraham Lincoln can best be seen, longest remembered, and
highest appreciated.
Truly, your old friend and co-laborer,
WILLIAM J. WILSON.
PLSr: New York Weekly Anglo-African, 7 October 1865. Reprinted in Lib., 27 October 1865.