The story of the Sun, New York, 1833-1918 / by Frank M. O'Brien.

190

THE STORY OF "THE SUN"

and " Miscellaneous." It was not a bad newspaper, and
it was quite possible that some business men would prefer it to the Beach kind of sheet; but it is certain that
the advertisers were not attracted and that some readers
were repelled. One of the latter climbed the stairs of
the building at Fulton and Nassau Streets early one
morning and nailed to the door of the editorial rooms a
placard which read: a Be ye not righteous overmuch! "
During the Morrison r6gime the Sun refused to accept
advertisements on Sunday. Of course, the printers
worked on Sunday night, getting out Monday's paper,
but that was something else. The Sun went so far
(July 23, 1861) as to urge that the Union generals
should be forbidden to attack the enemy on Sundays.
" Our troops must have rest, and need the Sabbath," it
said.
William C. Church, one of the rising young newspapermen of New York, was induced to become the
publisher under the Sun's new management. He was
only twenty-four years old, but he had had a good deal
of newspaper experience in assisting his father, the
Rev. Pharcellus Church, to edit and publish the New
York Chronicle. After a few weeks in the Sun office,
however, Mr. Church saw that the paper, though daily
treated with evangelical serum, was not likely to be a
howling success; and on December 10, 1860, four months
after he took hold as publisher, it was announced that
Mr. Church had "withdrawn from the publication of
the Sun for the purpose of spending some months in
European travel and correspondence for the paper."
Mr. Church wrote a few letters from Europe, but
when the Civil War started he hurried home and went
with the joint military and naval expedition headed by
General T. W. Sherman and Admiral S. F. Dupont.
He was present at the capture of Port Royal, and wrote