Fun facts to know and tell

by chuckofish

This week marks the anniversary of a great barbecue held in honor of Daniel Webster in 1837, the highlight of the statesman’s visit to St. Louis.

When news of Webster’s proposed visit reached St. Louis, arrangements for his reception were made at a meeting in the Masonic hall. A boat, the H. L. Kenney, was chartered to meet the steamer Robert Morris on which the Webster party was journeying through the West. The two boats met a little below Jefferson Barracks, and the committee of welcome boarded Webster’s steamer to greet the orator. The boats passed by the St. Louis wharf to give the visitors an opportunity to view the city and then returned to the Market street landing. Webster and his family stayed at the National Hotel during their stay in St. Louis.

A crowd of about 5000 gathered to hear the “God-like” Daniel speak on the day of the barbecue. A long procession of citizens, led by Charles Keemle as marshal of the day and accompanied by “a choice band of music,” escorted Webster to the site of the barbecue, a grove owned by Judge J. B. C. Lucas. After the barbecue, Webster delivered his address, which lasted an hour and forty minutes.

Although most contemporary historians and newspapers praised his speech, the Missouri Argus, voice of the Jacksonian Democrats, stated that Webster as an orator was “almost below mediocrity, or else at this city he made a most miserable and complete failure.” This attack was “probably more partisan than truthful”–gee, do you think?–the editor fearing the political effect of Webster’s visit and hoping to neutralize it. (You will recall that Webster joined with other Jackson opponents in forming the Whig Party, and unsuccessfully ran in the 1836 presidential election.)

Other writers praised the speech highly. Elihu Shepard wrote “…the great orator rose amid the acclamations of thousands and enchained their rapturous attention for eighty minutes”…. J. T. Scharf called the admiration expressed for Webster “one of the grandest demonstrations that ever took place in this country in honor of any public man.”

Shall we not, in all honesty and sincerity, with pure and disinterested love of country, as Americans, looking back to the renown of our ancestors and looking forward to the interests of our posterity, here, tonight, pledge our mutual faith to hold on to the last to our professed principles, to the doctrines of true liberty, and to the Constitution of the country, let who will prove true, or who will prove miscreant?

–Reception at New York, 1837

I must admit that I did not know that Daniel Webster ever visited St. Louis. Traveling to St. Louis back in the 1830s was, after all, quite an undertaking. Indeed, Francis Parkman did not visit until 1846. I’d love to know more, wouldn’t you? What did they serve I wonder?

All the past we leave behind;

We debouch upon a newer, mightier world, varied

Fresh and strong the world we seize, world of labor,

and the march,  Pioneers! O pioneers!

–Walt Whitman

(Information about the barbecue from St. Louis Day By Day by Frances Hurd Stadler)