Bridport, March 26, 1877.

Dear Mr. Douglass

We have often been thinking and talking of you, in relation to the Presidential contest. I saw in a London paper, that you are appointed Marshall of Washington; and we shall be glad to hear that it is a post that you care to accept. At one time, any post under Government would have been a victory; but now our hopes are raised; and we look for something with that manifests some distant approximation to power. With your unquestioned ability and long service, had you been of a different complexion, your reward would have been different. Yet, after all, your true reward is—when you have an opportunity of serving your people and your country.

With our English ways of looking

at things, I did not desire the appointment of HayesHayes, Rutherford Birchard

Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822-93), nineteenth president of the United States, had previously served as governor of his home state of Ohio (1867-71) and as a Republican congressman (1865-67). Although Hayes had supported the Radical Reconstruction program while in Congress, events during Grant's administration had convinced him that the remaining southern Republican state governments, led by carpetbaggers and blacks, could no longer sustain themselves even with federal military intervention. As president, Hayes attempted to reinvigorate the southern Republican party through a program of sectional reconciliation aimed at attracting former Whigs and Douglas Democrats into the party. He believed that the goodwill of southern whites was better protection for the political and civil rights of blacks than federal military force. Soon after his inauguration, Hayes ordered U.S. troops in Charleston and New Orleans away from the statehouses and back to their garrisons, causing the Republican governments in South Carolina and Louisiana to collapse in the face of the armed force of their Democratic opponents. Hayes also appointed numerous southern Democrats to federal office, including former Confederate general David M. Key, who became his postmaster general. Despite Hayes's hope, few new southern white voters joined the Republican party, and it shrank into a powerless minority in most of the region for the remainder of the nineteenth century. Kenneth L. Davison, The Presidency of Rutherford B. Hayes (Westport, Conn., 1972); Keith Dan Polakoff, The Politics of Inertia: The Election of 1876 and the End of Reconstruction (Baton Rouge, La., 1973), 246-51, 317-21; Vincent P. DeSantis, Republicans Face the Southern Question: The New Departure Years, 1877-1897 (1959; New York, 1969), 66-132; William Gillette, Retreat from Reconstruction, 1869-1879 (Baton Rouge, La., 1979), 335-52. (except for the sake of the freedmen). We think it a bad thing for the Government to be the nominees of a minority, and it seemed that the constituents of the electors of TildenTilden, Samuel J.

were the most numerous.

Beside which, when a party has been hanging on, as it were, and doing no great credit to its principles, it does them good to be on the cold shade of opposition for a time—it braces them up. The Conservatives here have done two or three mischievous things, and have omitted to do twenty or thirty good things; still I think that our Liberal party is all the better for being out of place.

We have been all the more true to our principles of freedom and we, ultra men, find that our leaders who have no longer the responsibility

of office, are becoming more radical. Meanwhile the Conservative government contains many useful men. I do not know any of the Liberal Administration who have been more ready to listen to my sister Mary'sCarpenter, Mary Browne

Mary Browne Carpenter (c. 1824–98) was the wife of the prominent Unitarian minister Russell Lant Carpenter (1819–92). They were married in Bridgwater, Somersetshire, in 1853. She was one of four daughters born to William Browne, a wealthy Unitarian merchant, and his wife, Mary. William Browne served as mayor of Bridgwater in 1854. In addition to her support of the antislavery effort, Mary Browne Carpenter was also deeply involved in the woman suffrage movement, belonging to one of the more radical suffrage societies in Bridport. She also supported the animal rights and temperance movements. 1841 England Census, Gloucestershire, Bristol, 22; “England and Wales, Christening Records, 1530–1906,” FamilySearch.org; “England and Wales, Death Index, 1837–1915,” FamilySearch.org; “England and Wales, Marriage Index, 1837–1915,” FamilySearch. org; “England and Wales, Non-Conformist Records Indexes, 1588–1977,” FamilySearch.org; Elizabeth Crawford, The Women’s Suffrage Movement in Britain and Ireland: A Regional Survey (New York, 2006), 161, 169.She has not been identified by name. opinions about India, e.g., than the Marquis of SalisburySalisbury, Lord

, and Sir S. Northcote. (Mary has been lately visiting us; we were talking together about you; she was very much pleased with the last photograph you sent us–which indeed has excited general envy!)

Perhaps there may be some advantage to the U.S. in having a President in Hayes's peculiar position. If we may judge from his Message he seems particularly anxious to deal fairly and justly by the whole country.: and I know that you felt it very important for the interests of your people, that the Democrats

should be defeated.

I am more sorry than surprised at the present state of things in the South. You know that I have no faith in war. My wonder was, that at first, things seemed to be working so smoothly. The adverse elements are now showing themselves. I do not profess to have kept pace with the politics of South Carolina and Louisiana. The Palmetto State deserves all the ills that the pride and tyranny of its planters have brought upon it—or rather they deserve the retribution; but the innocent, of both races, suffer with the guilty.

I forget whether your sons still keep on the National Era. When you are in the mood to write, you know how a letter pleases us; but if ever a Washington paper gives information respecting you, we shall be glad to receive it.

With kindest remembrances

Ever faithfully yours,

Russell L. CarpenterCarpenter, Russell Lant

The Reverend Russell Lant Carpenter (1816-92), a Unitarian minister, spent his childhood in Bristol, England. He attended Bristol College in preparation for a life of ministry, continued his studies at Manchester and York Colleges and was one of the first to graduate from London University in 1840. Carpenter became intensely involved in the temperance movement and subsequently quit his pastorate at Bridgwater, England, since part of the church's endowment came from taverns selling liquors. In August 18-19 he journeyed to the United States, where he spent a full year preaching from Montreal to St. Louis to Boston. His father, Dr. Lant Carpenter, was a well-known teacher whose Unitarian writings were already known to the antislavery men of the day. Thus, Carpenter became acquainted with Garrison, Douglass, and others. Having returned to England, he married in 1853 and continued his ministerial work there until his death. His works include Memoirs of Lant Carpenter (1842), Discourses and Devotional Services (1849), A Monotessaron (1851), and a biography about his brother, Philip, Memoirs of the Life and Work of Philip Pearsall Carpenter (1880). Carpenter also contributed frequently to the Inquirer and to other periodicals. London Inquirer, 30 January 1892.

P. S. March 28

My sister SusanGaskell, Susan Carpenter

Susan Carpenter Gaskell (b. 1811) was sibling to Russell Lant and Mary Carpenter. She worked at the family's boarding school, teaching music and playing the organ at chapel. After the death of her father Lant Carpenter, Susan began as housekeeper for her brother Phillip Carpenter. She married Robert Gaskell in 1850, brother-in-law to author Elizabeth Gaskell. Jo Manton, Mary Carpenter and the Children of the Streets (London, 1976), 21, 38, 59-60. , and a friend from whom we heard this morning, seem each greatly pleased with your appointment.

I hope it may be a more important one than I feared.

The Lord High Constable, and the Earl Marshall of England are very high officers of State; but they are merely ornamental! I hope that the "Marshall of Washington, D C." is a person of some authority. I notice that "the coloured people" (when will that phrase become obsolete!) mustered in great force at the inauguration of the President.