by Patrick Young, Esq. – Blogger
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Pat Cleburne had left his job as a druggist behind and become a lawyer by 1855, but it was his background in medicine that made him a local hero that year. 1
When Yellow Fever stuck Helena, Arkansas in September 1855, everyone who could leave town did so. Only two doctors were left behind to care for the sick. When they called for volunteers to succor the afflicted, Pat Cleburne, his friend Thomas Hindman and a minister were the only men willing to risk infection and stay. During the epidemic, the two friends formed a deep bond that lasted the rest of their lives. For his courageous service, the relatively new immigrant Pat Cleburne became an esteemed member of his community. He had a stake there that was worth defending.2
The Know Nothing presidential campaign of 1856 posed a threat to all Cleburne had earned during his life in Helena. Cleburne became locked in a battle with the anti-immigrant party. As a rising lawyer and a local hero, one with ties to the working class Irish voters in town, Cleburne was a prime catch for the Democrats. He spoke out forcefully against the Know Nothing proposal that immigrants be prohibited from voting during their first twenty-one years in America. The party’s rationale was that a baby born in the U.S. had to wait until he was 21 to vote, and a new immigrant should have to wait just as long. Cleburne’s early mentor Dr. Nash recalled later that Cleburne was incensed that the Know Nothings thought of new immigrants as the legal equivalent of infants. 3
Millard Fillmore ran for President in 1856 as the Know Nothing candidate. The New Yorker’s party was officially known as the “American” or “Union” Party, but his literature included the phrase “I Know Nothing”, the watchwords of the anti-immigrant movement.
On May 24, 1856, the Know Nothing presidential campaign was in full swing. The Know Nothing Party would get its largest vote ever that year. The Know Nothings were also engaged in a sometimes violent war to drive immigrants and their supporters out of the public square. When Thomas Hindman asked Pat Cleburne to walk to dinner with him that evening, he told Cleburne to arm himself. The Democratic leader Hindman’s political contest with the Know Nothings had become very personal and he was afraid of an ambush. Three Know Nothings waylaid Hindman and Cleburne, demanding that Hindman take back remarks in which he said that Democrats who became Know Nothings were “mulattos.” When Hindman refused, he was shot down. 4
Before he knew what was happening, Cleburne too was hit and fell. He managed to draw his gun and shot one of the attackers. Hindman, Cleburne, and the Know Nothing James Marriott were all badly wounded and expected to die.5
Marriott died but Cleburne and Hindman recovered. Cleburne had been shot through the lungs and he continued to suffer from the effects of the wound for the rest of his life. Years later, he wrote to his brother that “my lungs have never been well since I was wounded…an hour’s debate in the Court House will sometimes fill my mouth with blood.” 6
This map shows the percentage of votes won by Know Nothing Presidential candidate Millard Fillmore. His vote was highest in the slave states. South Carolina did not allow for a popular vote for president, which is why it shows no votes for Fillmore. Wikimedia
Cleburne scaled back his political involvement after the Know Nothings were beaten at the polls in 1856, but Hindman went on to Congress where he became a leading secessionist and defender of slavery. Cleburne would say later that he did not want to own slaves nor did he care much about slavery, but in the 1850s he used the rhetoric of states’ rights and the charge that the Know Nothings were secret abolitionists in his political work. 7
In the 1860 presidential election, Irish immigrants in the South tended to side with the National Democrats of Stephen Douglas against the secessionist Southern Democrats. The immigrants hoped to preserve the Union. Cleburne’s many native-born friends in Helena, however, favored the secessionist movement and the severing of the Union if Lincoln was elected.8
After Lincoln’s victory, Cleburne wrote to his brother in Ohio that he was depressed. He was afraid that the country was headed towards Civil War. With most of his family living in the North, he understood that they would be cut-off from him.9
This elephant postcard was sold in May, 1861 in Little Rock to celebrate Arkansas’ secession from the Union. Ironically, the elephant would soon become the symbol of the Republican Party of Lincoln.
By early 1861, Cleburne was clear that he would follow his state out of the Union if it came to that. He wrote of his Arkansas neighbors that; “these people have been my friends and have stood up for me on all occasions.” Even before the election, when the men of Helena formed a militia company, they had elected him its commanding captain.10
In spite of his decision to side with his neighbors, Cleburne’s Northern connections held complications for him. For example, even before Arkansas seceded his men captured a Northern-owned civilian riverboat in April of 1861. It was captained by a member of Cleburne’s extended Ohio family. Cleburne may have humiliated himself when he went before the Helena city council to beg that his relative be released and he was so overcome by emotion that he began to cry.11
Cleburne’s embarrassment did not diminish his worth in the eyes of his troops. On May 9, 1861, the Irish immigrant was elected the commanding colonel of his regiment. Just a month into the war, he was already one of the highest ranking immigrants in the Confederate west. 12
Sources
1. Meteor Shining Brightly: Essays on Major General Patrick R. Cleburne by Mauriel Phillips Joslyn Terrell House Publishing (1998); Stonewall of the West: Patrick Cleburne and the Civil War by Craig L. Symonds published by University Press of Kansas (1997); Biographical Sketches of Gen. Pat Cleburne and Gen. T.C. Hindman by Charles Nash published by Tunnah & Pittard (1898); Biographical Sketch of Major-General P.R. Cleburne by Gen. W.H. Hardee Southern Historical society Papers Vol. XXXI edited by R.A. Brock 1903 pp. 151-164
2.Stonewall of the West: Patrick Cleburne and the Civil War by Craig L. Symonds published by University Press of Kansas (1997) p. 39; Biographical Sketches of Gen. Pat Cleburne and Gen. T.C. Hindman by Charles Nash published by Tunnah & Pittard (1898) pp. 52-55.
3.Stonewall of the West: Patrick Cleburne and the Civil War by Craig L. Symonds published by University Press of Kansas (1997 ) pp. 40-41
4.Stonewall of the West: Patrick Cleburne and the Civil War by Craig L. Symonds published by University Press of Kansas (1997 ) p. 140-141; Biographical Sketches of Gen. Pat Cleburne and Gen. T.C. Hindman by Charles Nash published by Tunnah & Pittard (1898) pp. 62-70.
5.Stonewall of the West: Patrick Cleburne and the Civil War by Craig L. Symonds published by University Press of Kansas (1997) p. 141; Biographical Sketches of Gen. Pat Cleburne and Gen. T.C. Hindman by Charles Nash published by Tunnah & Pittard (1898) pp. 62-70.
6.Stonewall of the West: Patrick Cleburne and the Civil War by Craig L. Symonds published by University Press of Kansas (1997) p. 41
7.Stonewall of the West: Patrick Cleburne and the Civil War by Craig L. Symonds published by University Press of Kansas (1997) pp-40-42
8.Stonewall of the West: Patrick Cleburne and the Civil War by Craig L. Symonds published by University Press of Kansas (1997) pp-40-42
9.Stonewall of the West: Patrick Cleburne and the Civil War by Craig L. Symonds published by University Press of Kansas (1997) pp-40-44
10.Stonewall of the West: Patrick Cleburne and the Civil War by Craig L. Symonds published by University Press of Kansas (1997) p. 44
11.Stonewall of the West: Patrick Cleburne and the Civil War by Craig L. Symonds published by University Press of Kansas (1997) p. 48
12.Stonewall of the West: Patrick Cleburne and the Civil War by Craig L. Symonds published by University Press of Kansas (1997 )pp. 49-50
