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With Illinois as a slave State, and with the sure prospect of a further spread of slavery in the northwest, small as the stream of emigration was, it would have ceased coming to the United States. It would have been directed to Canada, or deflected to Australia, New Zealand and to the Dutch and Huguenot colonies at the Cape of Good Hope.

The eastern states would have dwindled in poverty. There would have been no incentive to domestic manufacture.

With the spread of slavery in the northwest, there would have been no trumped up excuse for a war with Mexico. There would have been no acquisition of California; no gold discovery that has changed the whole material and social features of the country; go which ever way you will and for thousands of miles you are among neighbors.

There would have been no civil war. The slave power would have had eminent domain in this land, and the present United States, instead of being a triumphant actuality, would have remained the feverish dream of an enthusiastic lunatic.

That feeble majority was brought about by the work of a few intrepid men who were willing to fight for better things. Foremost among these was Morris Birkbeck. Look back at the situation and the desperate crisis. There was the State-an immature maiden in the grasp of rapacious lust and cruel greed-crying for a deliverer. Birkbeck came to her relief. With masterful strength and tact he encouraged her friends and beat off her enemies; took her by the hand, led her, turned her face toward the Goddess of Liberty and bade her smile. She owes to her fearless champion a debt of eternal gratitude.

Now in the plentitude, gladness and majesty of more mature years, let her erect to the memory of this man a monumental shaft fitting to his worth and work. Let it be surmounted by an enduring bronze figure of her defender in her hour of need, that all generations may see and learn to love him. Let this grateful tribute rise on the lake. shore of the city he made possible, facing the east whence he came, facing the sun in his rising-that his radiant beams shall gild the benignant countenance with a glory akin to that he caused to gleam on the face of the maiden Illinois.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF MAJ. GEN. JAMES D. MORGAN.

(By Hon. William H. Collins.)

James D. Morgan was born in Boston, Mass., Aug. 1st, 1810. His father was a sea captain in the East India trade. When nine years of age he quit school, and, thrown upon his own resources, he became an apprentice in a cooper shop. Active and full of the spirit of adventure, so quiet and prosaic an employment did not suit him and at the age of sixteen years, he shipped for a term of three years upon the ship Beverly.

When about 30 days at sea, a mutiny broke out. This was suppressed, but later, the vessel burned to the water's edge, the crew escaping in boats. They were several hundred miles from land. Drifting in their boats, they suffered great privation and severe hardships, but finally landed upon the coast of South America.

He returned to his native city and found employment with Peleg Churchill. Among the papers left by the general, I find the following contract: Boston, Oct. 27, 1832. This agreement made and concluded between Peleg Churchill on one part, and James D. Morgan on the other part, witnesseth: That the said Morgan agrees to work for the said Churchill one year from the 29th, at the following rates as foreman of his, the said Churchill's fish store or shop, as the case may be. The first six months, the said Churchill is to pay the said Morgan $1.42 per day, including evenings when the business shall require it, and $1.50 per day the last six months: Provided, however, that if the said Churchill shall want the said Morgan in the cooper shop before the first six months shall expire, then the said Churchill is to pay the said Morgan $1.50 per day from the time he commences in the cooper shop. Said Morgan is to lose his own time when he is absent and receive his wages on demand by performing his part of this contract."

With this prospect of earning $1.42 per day, he married Miss Jane Strachan. In 1834, he left his native city and settled in Quincy, Illinois. He engaged in various enterprises. Pork packing was one of the most important kinds of business at that time. Quincy became an important center of trade for a large district. The river afforded. an outlet toward the south for the products of the farms of this part of Illinois. The manufacture of whiskey, flour and pork products created a great demand for barrels. To supply this demand, in con

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nection with Mr. Ed. Wells, he established an extensive cooper shop. The forests of the country furnished an unlimited supply of cooperage material, and the business was eminently successful.

After five years he became engaged in a bakery and confectionary store. For a time he had an interest in a grocery store. He became a contractor for public work and paved the levee at the steamboat landing. The substantial and durable character of this work, after the wear and tear of more than half a century, attests the honesty and thoroughness with which he executed his contract.

He entered into partnership with C. M. Pomeroy, under the name of Pomeroy & Co., for the packing of pork. The firm afterward became Pomeroy, Morgan & Bond. He was engaged in this business for about 25 years. He accumulated a comfortable fortune, as fortunes were estimated at that day.

Morgan had belonged to a military company in Boston. He had a natural fondness for military affairs. If he had any over-mastering passion, it was for a soldier's career. Consequently, he threw himself with energy and enthusiasm into the work of organizing a military company in the young city of his residence. He helped recruit and organize the "Quincy Greys." It became a company of marked local fame for the excellence of its drill. It was armed with the oldfashioned flint-lock musket. It drilled in accordance with the Scott Manual of Arms and Tactics. Organized in 1837, this company was maintained for several years and out of it grew organizations which were kept up in some form, until the breaking out of the civil war in 1861.

The Mormon war having its theater of operations in Hancock county, immediately north of Quincy, Morgan was brought into prominence, as the captain of a company of about 50 men, called the "Quincy Riflemen." They were mounted, and during the war did patrol and police duty.

Upon the breaking out of the war with Mexico, Captain Morgan organized a company of 100 men. It was made Company A of the First regiment Illinois infantry, commanded by Col. John J. Hardin.* Hardin was killed in the battle of Buena Vista. Captain Morgan was on detached service at the time of this battle, but from the roof of a church upon the position he was detailed to guard, the battle field was in full view. He once told me of the chagrin and disappointment he felt at being compelled to remain an inactive spectator. So far from congratulating himself and his command, for being out of the risks of the fight, it was a grief to him to be denied the "luxury" of it. He appreciated the gay sally of General Kearney, who, when asked by a commander of a regiment where he should "go in," replied, "go in anywhere; there is lively fighting all along the line."

* See letters of Hardin to Morgan appended to this sketch. Origina! letters in library of Quincy Historical society.

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