Anecdotes of public men; by John W. Forney.

ANDREW H. REEDER. I93
a fund provided to establish them at some future day in Africa
or in the West Indies. It is my wish that my children shall not
transmit them to any of my grandchildren."
It was a sad yet happy day and a half I spent among these
interesting men. Amid their abounding hospitality there was
still a presentiment upon me, and so when I returned to Washington, and found Sydney Webster, private secretary of President Pierce, waiting for me at the station, I knew something
had happened. He had come to announce that Andrew H.
Reeder had been that day removed as Governor of Kansas. It
was the beginning of the end. Jefferson Davis, of Mississippi,
was too powerful for either Hon. Asa Packer or myself, and our
gallant friend was ejected from his place only because he had refused to consent to the conspiracy to make Kansas a slave State.
We had jointly recommended the appointment of Andrew H.
Reeder to this post, really in response to President Pierce's
suggestion, who was anxious to give it to a Pennsylvanian.
When Reeder accepted he was in high favor with the Democracy of the old Tenth Legion of Pennsylvania. An extreme
sympathizer with the South at all times, his experience in Kansas completely converted him. Honest, independent in his
circumstances, a very able lawyer, and an entrancing speaker,
he was just the character for a new country, just the man to
save the Administration from fatal complications. When the
President nominated him, Hon. Richard Brodhead, then one of
the Pennsylvania Senators, and always the rival of Reeder, or
Reeder of him, did not conceal his disappointment, but Judge
Packer, who lived in the same Congressional district, was too
strong for Brodhead to fight, and Reeder was confirmed. Then
our friend went forth to Kansas, free, fair, and unprejudiced.
He had not been there long before he wrote back to us, denouncing the open frauds of the slaveholders. I well remember
the effect produced upon our minds. But Jefferson Davis's
friends were potent with the Executive: their falsehoods were
I