GEORGE T. DOWNING¹George T. Downing (1819–1903) was the eldest son of Thomas Downing, a well-known black restaurateur in New York City. After receiving an education at the city’s segregated Mulberry Street School and at Hamilton College, he worked in his father’s business until 1855, when he opened a hotel in Newport, Rhode Island. Downing was active in the Underground Railroad and led a successful effort to integrate Rhode Island public schools. He supported Douglass in the public controversy with Henry H. Garnet over the merits of the latter’s African Civilization Society. In 1859, Downing presided over a convention of New England blacks that gave a qualified endorsement to the Republican party. During the Civil War, Downing moved to Washington, D.C., and became manager of the House of Representatives’ restaurant. In February 1866, he was the chairman of a committee of blacks, including Douglass, who held an interview with President Andrew Johnson during which the chief executive urged his audience to abandon their advocacy of black suffrage. Lib., 20 July 1855; New York Weekly Anglo-African, 19 September 1859, 21 April 1860; NASS, 24 February 1866; Cleveland Gazette, 12 September 1885; New York Times, 22 July 1903; William J. Simmons, Men of Mark: Eminent, Progressive, and Rising (1887; Chicago 1970), 1003–06; James M. McPherson, The Struggle for Equality: Abolitionists and the Negro in the Civil War and Reconstruction (Princeton, N.J., 1964), 343–46; Guichard Parris, “George T. Downing,” NHB, 5: 42 (November 1941); Rhoda G. Freeman, “The Free Negro in New York City in the Era before the Civil War” (Ph.D. diss., Columbia University, 1966), 46, 49–56; Rayford W. Logan and Michael R. Winston, eds., Dictionary of American Negro Biography (New York, 1982), 187–88. TO FREDERICK DOUGLASS

Washington, [D.C.]²Downing added that his address was “Davis Hotel, 212 1st St.” Downing is probably referring to the old Davis Hotel in Washington, D.C. John Davis opened his hotel in the early 1800s on the north side of Pennsylvania Avenue between 6th and 7th streets northwest. In 1815 the hotel was briefly known as McKeown’s; in 1820 the manager, Jesse Brown, expanded the building, renaming it the Indian Queen Hotel. Occasionally it was known as Brown’s Hotel. In 1851 the hotel was again enlarged and was renamed Brown’s Marble Hotel. In 1865 the hotel was sold by the Brown family and given the name Metropolitan Hotel. Judah Delano, The Washington Directory Showing the Name, Occupation, and Residence, of Each Head of Family and Person in Business: The Names of the Members of Congress, and Where They Board: Together with Other Useful Information (Washington, D.C., 1822), 20; Washington Daily National Intelligencer, 2 August, 7 November 1820; Henry Clay, The Papers of Henry Clay, ed. James F. Hopkins, 10 vols. (Lexington, Ky., 1963) 3: 69n, 531n; U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service, The Pennsylvania Avenue District in United States History: A Report on the National Significance of Pennsylvania Avenue and Historically Related Environs, Washington, D.C. (Washington, D.C., 1965), 28; Thomas J. Carrier, Washington, D.C.: A Historical Walking Tour (Chicago, 1999), 47. 18 Jan[uary] 1866.

Dear Douglass,

We are at work and doing service, you will learn by the accompanying slip from the Chronical of this morning, who is here:³Downing perhaps sent Douglass a “card” he had gotten published in the Washington Daily Chronicle on 17 January 1866. The seven signatories, including Downing and Lewis H. Douglass, called on Congress to enfranchise the African American citizens of the District of Columbia. They declared: “[T]hat in seeking this right we ask for no curtailment of the rights of others, but an extension of a right which every American citizen should enjoy for his protection and due respect.” We want you
<here> very much.⁴Downing is referring to the planned National Convention of Colored Men, which was ultimately held at the Fifteenth Street Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C., at the end of January 1866. Douglass attended the convention and delivered a speech on 1 February. Delegates from thirteen states and the District of Columbia gathered to discuss the Freedmen’s Bureau Bill, colonization, and enfranchisement. At its conclusion, the convention sent a group of delegates—including Douglass, his son Lewis, and Downing—to meet with President Johnson on 7 February to lobby for the Freedmen’s Bureau Bill and implore his aid in the fight for black equality. Douglass Papers, ser. 1, 4: xxi; Montpelier (Vt.) Watchman and State Journal, 2 February 1866; Savannah (Ga.) Daily Herald, 8 February 1866; Martin R. Delany, Martin R. Delany: A Documentary Reader, ed. Robert S. Levine (Chapel Hill, N.C., 2003), 403; Douglas R. Egerton, The Wars of Reconstruction: The Brief, Violent History of America’s Most Progressive Era (New York, 2014), 192. Your presence [illegible] [illegible] <would be> worth
many lectures, Gen Howard⁵Oliver Otis Howard (1830–1909), soldier, teacher, and government official, was born in Leeds, Maine. He graduated from Bowdoin College in 1850 and then entered the U.S. Military Academy. Howard graduated in 1854, ranked fourth in his class. He first served at federal arsenals in New York and Maine and then was sent to Florida to fight in the Seminole War in 1856. He returned to West Point the following year to teach mathematics, remaining there until the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861. Howard became colonel of a volunteer regiment, the Third Maine, and following the First Battle at Bull Run in July 1861, he was promoted to brigadier general. In the spring of 1862, most of his right arm was amputated after it was injured at the Battle at Fair Oaks. Howard returned to service in August 1862. Despite subpar performances during battles such as Chancellorsville and Gettysburg, Sherman selected him to lead the Army of the Tennessee following the death of James McPherson. President Johnson appointed Howard head of the newly formed Freedmen’s Bureau, a federal agency designed to aid freedmen from the former Confederacy. While Howard did not earn this position based on any outstanding efforts in the cause of emancipation, his well-known Christian beliefs appealed to those in other freedmen’s aid societies who believed he would do all in his power to help the emancipated slaves. In 1867 he cofounded Howard University in Washington, D.C., serving as its president from 1869 to 1874. In the 1870s, he traveled west to support the federal government in its relations with the Native Americans. In 1872 he negotiated an end to Apache raiding, and in 1873 he took command of the Department of the Columbia, which included Oregon, Washington, Alaska, and portions of Idaho. In the following years, he was ordered to capture Native American groups that refused to stay on government reservations, which included Chief Joseph’s Nez Percé. After returning east, he served as superintendent of West Point (1881–82). He was promoted to major general in 1886 and had several more commands in the peacetime army before retiring in 1894. Howard settled in Burlington, Vermont, where he published volumes of his memoirs as well as biographies of Zachary Taylor and Queen Isabella. His last act of service was an effort to educate the population of southern Appalachia, which led to the establishment of Lincoln Memorial University in Harrogate, Tennessee. O. O. Howard, Autobiography of Oliver Otis Howard, Major General, United States Army, 2 vols. (New York, 1907); John A. Carpenter, Sword and Olive Branch: Oliver Otis Howard (1964; New York, 1999), 2, 6, 18, 23, 32–33; William S. McFeely, Yankee Stepfather: General O. O. Howard and the Freedmen (New York, 1968), 27–39; ANB (online). of the Freedmans Bureau⁶Legislation suggested by President Lincoln to create the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands, popularly known as the Freedmen’s Bureau, passed Congress in March 1865. Although originally authorized for only a single year after the conclusion of military hostilities, the bureau remained in operation until 1872. It originally supplied displaced southerners, white as well as black, with temporary rations, shelter, health care, and other essential services. Most whites soon ceased taking assistance from the Freedmen’s Bureau, and Andrew Johnson unsuccessfully attempted to block legislation to extend its mandate. Under the leadership of General O. O. Howard, the bureau expanded its mission into establishing schools and arbitrating labor disputes concerning freedmen. These moves engendered vociferous opposition from whites in the South, and Grant allowed financial appropriations for bureau operations to dwindle. He terminated the agency in 1872 after reassigning Howard to deal with Indian problems in the West. Eric Foner, Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution, 1863–1877 (New York, 1988), 68–70, 82–88, 144–51; William S. McFeely, Frederick Douglass (New York, 1991), 257–58. sent word to us
last evening that he would like to have an interview with the delegation,
and appointed this morning at 10 o,c; for certain reasons which I cannot at
present stop to explain I think it best to postpone the same,⁷There is conflicting information regarding this meeting. Contemporary newspapers claim that on 23 January 1866 the delegation, led by George Downing, “had an interview today by invitation with General Howard, at which they made known their views.” But in his autobiography, Howard refers to a meeting with “some delegates from the colored people” sometime after 21 February 1866, when he returned to Washington, D.C., following a trip to New York. Sources confirm that Howard went on a speaking tour of New England in February 1866 and returned to Washington on 19 February. The fact that he met with President Johnson regarding the Freedmen’s Bureau on 24 February is further evidence he was indeed in Washington at this time. It is possible these conflicting sources point to two different meetings, one in January and one in February, between black leaders and Howard. Douglass, who did not arrive in Washington, D.C., until late January 1866, would not have been at a meeting on 23 January, but, according to Howard, did meet with him at this alleged February 1866 meeting. Douglass Papers, ser. 1, 4: xxi; Boston Daily Advertiser, 24 January 1866; Bangor (Me.) Daily Whig & Courier, 24 January 1866, 14 February 1866; Savannah (Ga.) Daily Herald, 8 February 1866; Cleveland Daily Cleveland Herald, 24 February 1866; Howard, Autobiography, 2: 309, 317–18; McFeely, Yankee Stepfather, 243, 245. and shall work
to that end this morning (it is now 6 o,c A M, writing by candle light) I
will say that I want you and Whipper⁸William Whipper (1804–76) first became known for his “free labor and temperance” grocery in Philadelphia. During the 1830s, he attended the annual National Negro Conventions regularly, and in 1835 he helped found the American Moral Reform Society and served as the editor of its journal, the National Reformer. That same year, Whipper moved to Pennsylvania’s interior, where he became involved in the lumber business and the Underground Railroad. Initially, Whipper rejected the idea of racially based reform movements, but late in life he came to accept African American organizations as necessary for the advancement of racial equality. Because he desired the “moral elevation” of African Americans within American society, he often agreed with Douglass’s approach to political and social reform. During the 1850s, Whipper supported the emigrationist movement, but the outbreak of the Civil War prevented him from moving himself and his family to Canada. Instead, he returned to Philadelphia after the war and worked as a cashier for the Freedmen’s Savings Bank, which failed in 1873. Richard P. McCormick, “William Whipper: Moral Reformer,” Pennsylvania History, 43: 23–48 (January 1976); Jack Salzman, David L. Smith, and Cornel West, eds., Encyclopedia of AfricanAmerican Culture and History, 5 vols. (New York, 1996), 5: 2817–18; DANB, 643. present, we will get the Representation hall⁹It is possible that Downing is referring to the hall of the House of Representatives. During this time, Downing served as the manager of the House of Representatives dining room and might have referred to the chamber hall as “Representation Hall.” Following his speech on 1 February 1866 at the National Equal Suffrage Convention, Douglass gave a lecture titled “Assassination and Its Lessons” on the 13th at the First Presbyterian Church. According to reports, many members of Congress attended the event, as did Chief Justice Salmon Chase and George Downing. Perhaps Downing initially scheduled this speaking event for the House of Representatives but later moved it to the First Presbyterian Church. Douglass Papers, ser. 1, 4: xxi; Boston Daily Advertiser, 14 February 1866; Washington Daily National Intelligencer, 10 March 1866; Lowell (Mass.) Daily Citizen and News, 13 March 1866; McFeely, Frederick Douglass, 247. for you and Martin¹⁰Downing probably alludes to John Sella Martin (1832–76), minister, abolitionist, and poet, who was born a slave in Charlotte, North Carolina, and served masters in several southern states. In December 1855 he escaped from his master in New Orleans on a steamboat heading north. Self-educated while in slavery, Martin studied for the Baptist ministry in Detroit and later led churches in Buffalo, New York; London, England; and elsewhere, most notably the Joy Street Baptist Church in Boston, Shiloh Presbyterian Church in New York City, and the Fifteenth Street Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C. An effective antislavery crusader at home and abroad, open to various strategies, including emigration, he also worked with the English Freedmen’s Aid Society and the American Missionary Association to raise funds to assist ex-slaves. After the Civil War, Martin was active in the Colored National Labor Union, which he represented at the World’s Labor Congress in Paris in 1870, and edited the Washington New Era from January to June 1870, when the newspaper was reorganized and Douglass became principal owner and editor. After moving to Louisiana, he served as both a postmaster and district school superintendent. FDP, 20 April 1860; Washington New Era, 14 April 1870; William Wells Brown, The Black Man: His Antecedents, His Genius, and His Achievements (New York, 1863), 242–45; Philip S. Foner and Ronald L. Lewis, eds., The Black Worker: A Documentary History from Colonial Times to the Present, 8 vols. (Philadelphia, 197884), 2: 42, 59, 71; Jane H. Pease and William H. Pease, They Who Would Be Free: Blacks’ Search for Freedom, 1830–1861 (New York, 1974), 249, 271–72, 287–90; John W. Blassingame, ed., Slave Testimony: Two Centuries of Letters, Speeches, Interviews, and Autobiographies (Baton Rouge, La., 1977), 2–35; C. Peter Ripley, ed., The Black Abolitionist Papers, 5 vols. (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1985–92), 1: 504–05; DANB, 427–28. to speak in, I have spoken to Colfax¹¹Schuyler Colfax (1823–85), a congressman and vice president of the United States, was born in New York City. In 1834 his mother married George W. Matthews, and the family moved to New Carlisle, Indiana. He worked as a clerk in his stepfather’s store, and when Matthews was elected county auditor on the Whig ticket, he moved with Matthews to South Bend and served as his deputy until 1849. Colfax read law, but his passion was politics. In 1844 he married Evelyn Clark, and shortly after, he bought a half interest in a local paper, which he renamed the St. Joseph Valley Register. For nearly two decades, he served as editor, and the paper became a major Whig, and, later, Republican, newspaper in Indiana. In 1854 he opposed the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act while simultaneously supporting temperance and nativism, which led him to join the Know Nothing party in Indiana. He then successfully ran for Congress as a representative of the “People’s party,” an early Indiana version of the Republican party. He served in Congress from 1855 to 1869, and was elected Speaker of the House in 1863, serving until his departure from Congress in 1869. Although not an early supporter of Lincoln, he championed the Republican party and advised the president on Indiana politics throughout the war. Regarded as conservative, competent, and loyal, he was nominated by the Republicans to run as Ulysses S. Grant’s vice presidential candidate in the 1868 election. During his time in office, he was plagued by scandals: he accepted contributions from a government contractor, often requested railroad passes, and became involved in the Crédit Mobilier scandal. In the 1872 election, the Republicans did not retain Colfax on the ticket, and he left politics the following March. Despite these ethical problems that surrounded him, many of his supporters argued he had been treated unfairly, and he remained popular. He became a successful orator, traveling throughout the country to speak on temperance, Lincoln, and the American West. He collapsed on a lecture tour and died in Mankato, Minnesota, in 1885. Edward Winslow Martin, The Life and Public Services of Schuyler Colfax: Together with His Most Important Speeches (New York, 1868), 12–14, 19–20, 153–56, 237–244; ANB, 5: 230–31. and
others about the Same. Let me urge you to be present as soon as possible
say when you will certainly be in Washington.

Yours & c

GEORGE T. DOWNING

ALS: General Correspondence File, reel 2, frames 180–81, FD Papers, DLC.