Letter of Col. John Lewis Peyton
a disputed poem—proof that the earl of derby did not write the poem to general lee.
Staunton, Va., December 3, 1877.
To the Baltimore Gazette:
In your paper of the 30th of November you introduce the following lines, with the remark, “On the fly-leaf of the copy of the Iliad given by the late Earl of Derby to General Robert E Lee were the following verses:”
The grave old bard, who never dies,
Receive him in our native tongue;
I send thee, but with weeping eyes,
The story that he sung.
Thy Troy has fallen—thy dear land
Is marred beneath the spoiler’s heel;
I cannot trust my trembling hand
To write the grief I feel.
Oh, home of tears! But let her bear
This blazon to the end of time;
No nation rose so white and fair,
None fell so pure of crime.
The widow’s moan, the orphan’s wail,
Are round thee; but in truth be strong;
Eternal right, though all things fail,
Can never be made wrong.
An angel’s heart, an angel’s mouth,
(Not Homer’s) could alone for me
Hymn forth the great Confederate South;
Virginia first—then Lee.
Permit me to say that you are in error in attributing these lines to the late Earl of Derby. Lord Derby was an eminent statesman, as well as distinguished scholar, and during the whole period of the civil war in our country was the leader of the opposition, or Tory party in the British Parliament. Never during this time did he criticise adversely the policy of Lord Palmerston in refusing recognition to the Confederate government. So far from it, he distinctly and repeatedly announced his concurrence in the course of the British cabinet. Had he been at the head of her majesty’s government at that period I am satisfied that he would have adhered strictly to the policy of Palmerston and Gladstone in this particular. This was his firm position, though urged to use his influence to secure Confederate recognition by many influential gentlemen of the Tory party, among them Sir Seymour Fitzgerald, the present governor of Bombay; Mr. Beresford Hope, M. P.; Mr. Gregory, M. P. for Galway, and others not so well known in this country.
Such was Lord Derby’s anxiety to relieve the distress arising from the cotton famine in Lancashire, lest it might lead to popular agitation in favor of a recognition of the Southern States, that he made a single subscription to the relief fund of £5,000. Not only in this case, but in many others throughout the war, he showed himself anything else than what was styled in those days in England “a friend and sympathizer with the South.”
It is not at all likely, then, that his lordship would, whatever his admiration of the character and military genius of General Lee, have addressed him the foregoing lines, nor is it true. The lines were written by a young and gifted English poet, now no more, Philip Stanhope Worsely. Mr. W. was a scholar of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, and died about ten years since. He gave the world in 1861 a translation of the Odyssey in the Gregorian stanza—one of the most pleasing hitherto produced—and in 1865 published a translation of the Iliad in the Spenserian stanza. A copy of this latter work he sent to General Lee, with a little poem of presentation written on the fly-leaf. It was seen by the General’s friends, who requested a transcript of the verses for publication, but he would never permit them to be printed, his native modesty shrinking from the warm panegyric they embodied. Now that both poet and soldier have passed away there is no good reason why they should be withheld from the public eye, and I must express my gratification at seeing them in The Gazette. At the same time it is due to the memories of both that the error into which you have unconsciously fallen should be corrected, and this is the sole motive with which I have addressed you this brief and hasty note.
J. Lewis Peyton.
Footnotes
1 Note.—In the library and papers of his son, J. L. Peyton, which were stored for safe keeping on his estate in Alleghany on Jackson’s River, and in the Valley of the Falling Spring, in the Spring of 1861, there were many boxes of MSS., letters from various members of the family, written between 1740 and 1860, and often the answers of them. The letters were from John Peyton, who died in 1760, John Rowze Peyton, John Sergeant, C. J. Ingersoll, Jos. R. Ingersoll, J. M. Berrian, Thos. Jefferson, John Marshall, James Madison, Bishop Madison, Governor Tyler, John Scott, of Fauquier, Dr. Alexander, D. D., Bishop Meade, B. W. Leigh, Chapman Johnson, John S. Archer, Gov’r. McDowell, Governor Campbell, Thos. H. Benton, Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, Wm. C. Rives, Gen. Francis Preston, Wm. C. Preston, William Preston, J. M. Preston, Wm. B. Preston, John Floyd, Judge A. G. Dade, John Yates, Bushrod Washington, Gov. Thos. Mann Randolph, H. A. Wise, John Randolph, of Roanoke, John Tyler, Spencer Roane, and others; and Mr. Peyton’s letter book, beginning about 1806. The whole of this invaluable mass was burnt, or destroyed, together with Col. Peyton’s library, by Federal troops during the civil war. Cr.
2 LEWIS LITTLEPAGE. Note.—The James here mentioned was James Littlepage Woodville, who married Mrs. Peyton’s eldest sister, Mary Lewis.—Mr. Woodville resided at Fincastle and Buchanan, and was a prominent lawyer and president of the Bank of Buchanan. His father was Rev. John Woodville, Rector of St. Mark’s Parish, Culpeper Co., and a native of North Britain. He was a nephew of the celebrated, but eccentric Lewis Littlepage, whose career was brilliant and unequaled. Littlepage was born in Virginia in 1762, and died at Fredericksburg in 1802. At the age of 17 he went to Europe, and in 1779-80 accompanied Mr. Jay, American Envoy, to the Court of Spain, Madrid. Though only a youth, his figure was fine and manly—his dark eyes bright and penetrating. Among his acquaintances he was regarded as a prodigy of genius and acquirements.—Shortly after reaching Madrid, Littlepage separated from Mr. Jay’s family, and joined as a volunteer aid, the duke of Cuillon, and was with the army at the siege of Minorca. At the siege of Gibralter he was on a floating battery and blown up, but being uninjured was rescued from the sea and distinguished himself during the further operations against that fortress. On the return of the fleet to Cadiz, he was sent with despatches to Madrid, where the Court received and treated him with much distinction. He then proceeded to Paris, and was on terms of friendship with Dr. Franklin, who was then living at Passy.—At Paris and Versailles this adventurous, young Virginian moved in the best society and attracted marked attention from all. After a brief visit to London, he returned to the Continent and made a tour of Europe, establishing himself at Warsaw, where he was so popular that he rose to be in effect, the King’s Prime Minister. He resisted and defeated the plans of Zamoyski before the Diet. He afterwards went to St. Petersburg as Ambassador from Poland, and acquitted himself with distinguished ability and became a favorite of the Empress Catherine. The following letter of Lewis Littlepage to Lewis Holiday takes up the history of his life where our account ends and completes the story of his eventful career in Europe.
3 STONY HILL. Note.—It may not be uninteresting to mention that the Stony Hill mansion was an old red brick building erected in the 17th century, with a wide hall and Grecian portico, commanding an extensive and beautiful view of Aquia creek and the Potomac river. The dwelling had grown to be a large and rambling domicile under the additions of four generations of the Peyton’s, and all of them improving men. This fine old colonial house was demolished during the first year of the Civil-war, 1861-62, by Federal troops, on the spurious pretext that it was a necessity to have at once material for baking ovens. The old red bricks of this stately home, brought from England, as ballast in sailing vessels sent out to fetch back tobacco to Bristol, were used to erect many ovens in which bread was baked for the invading northern army.
When John Peyton lived at Stony Hill the estate consisted of 1900 acres of fine land, and as far as the writer knows, still does. It is owned and occupied in 1894, by Mr. Moncure, a son of the late President of the Virginia Court of Appeals, Judge R. C. L. Moncure, whose widow still lives, and is a descendent of John Peyton.
4 Foot Note.—Mr. Madison was elected President in 1809 and re-elected in 1813.
5 This refers to the sale of the personal property of Colonel John Lewis, Mrs. Peyton’s father.
6 The mail was then carried on horseback, and the postoffice was in the office of the tavern.
7 Hon. James Taylor, M. C. for this district and an old and intimate friend of Mr. Peyton, who served with Major Peyton in the army during the war of 1812-15 and whose friendship was continued up to the time of Mr. Peyton’s death in 1847.
8 Subsequently M. C. for this district and Governor of Virginia—Governor McDowell and Mrs. Taylor were both first cousins of Mrs. Peyton.
9 The late Major Thomas Preston Lewis, the youngest son of Major John Lewis, of the Sweet Springs, a man of many noble traits of character, who died unmarried in Augusta county in 1877, deeply regretted.
10 Hon. Thomas H. Benton, U. S. Senator for Missouri, and author of “Thirty Years’ View; or, a history of the working of the American Government for thirty years, from 1820 to 1850.” Colonel Benton married Miss McDowell, a sister of Governor James McDowell, a cousin of Mrs. J. H. Peyton.
11 Mr. Loyal was the father of Mrs. Admiral Farragut—the gallant Admiral so much distinguished during the war.
12 This was a farm of 350 acres lying in the Sweet Spring Valley, inherited by Mrs. Peyton from her father, and in 1894 is owned by her nephew, Dr. J. Lewis Woodville.
13 Susan Taylor married some years subsequently Hon. John B. Weller, M. C. from Ohio, and afterwards Governor of California.
14 Note.—The late Wm. Frazier, who was present, informed us that it was the most felicitous address he ever heard from one great man to another, and he greatly regretted that a stenographer had not been present to take it down.
15 He was an inmate of the Asylum but allowed to go at large.
16 Thomas L. Preston, of Abingdon, and brother of Hon. Wm. C. Preston, of South Carolina.
17 The child was named Virginia Frances, and is, in 1894, the widow of Col. Joseph F. Kent, of Wytheville, Va., and the mother of three fine children.
18 An estate of Gen. Bernard Peyton’s on the upper James River.
19 Robert Ludwell Yates Peyton, afterwards a distinguished lawyer State Senator of Missouri, a Colonel in the Confederate army and Senator for the State of Missouri in the Senate of the Confederate States of America. He died from disease contracted before Vicksburg, Miss.
20 The late distinguished Col. John B. Baldwin, who married Mr. Peyton’s eldest daughter Susan. Col. Baldwin was Colonel of the 52nd Regiment during the Civil war and member of the Confederate Congress, and was a man of eminent ability.
21 Note.—Wm. H. Holcombe, physician and Swedenborgian writer—a brother of James P. Holcombe—and the author of “Our Children in Heaven,” “The other life,” etc., etc.
22 Note.—During the administration of President Grant appointed Minister Resident to Portugal.
23 Afterwards Gen. Geo. W. Getty, U. S. A.
24 Col. Peyton’s eldest daughter, afterwards Mrs. Jos. H. White.
25 L. Waddell, Sr.
26 In 1851-52, Mr. Webster then Secretary of State, dispatched his son, John Lewis Peyton, to Europe and expressed a wish to have him permanently in the diplomatic service.
27 The young man above mentioned was D. S. Young himself.
28 When little Anne Lewis left the Sweet Springs for Mr. C’s school, she bore the following letter from her mother to him.
Sweet Springs, July 23rd, 1811.
Mr. Crutchfield:
Dear Sir—With the sincerest pleasure I send my dear little Anne to you again. I hope nothing will happen, not even an indulgence of my affection for her, to cause her coming home again shortly, for to you, I confide with confidence her entire education, and I hope your labors will be crowned with success by Him above, who is able to give abundantly.
It has been with much persuasion and many difficulties I have succeeded in getting Mr. L’s consent to Anne and Margaret Lynn being sent to you. I need not say anything as to Anne’s temper and disposition. I know your penetration is sufficient, and in your judgment and tenderness [to improve both] I have entire confidence. You can do more to improve her than I can and I know you will. I have many happy proofs of the great good, both in mind and manners, that have accompanied your exertions towards my family.
Heaven bless and prosper you, is the wish of your friend,
Mary P. Lewis.
P. S. My respects to Mrs. Crutchfield. I have sent a cot and bedding for Anne and Lynn.
29 The following letter from John Preston, Treasurer of the State of Virginia, gives a brief account of the death of his sister, Mary Preston Lewis.
Greenfield, Botetourt County, Va.,
February 8th, 1824.
Dear Sister:
The painful duty of informing you of the death of our beloved Sister Lewis devolves on me. She expired on Wednesday the 4th, (Feb. 4th, 1824) at her home at the Sweet Springs. She had lingered for some time but no dangerous symptoms appeared in her complaint, nor was any alarm excited. She, however, became suddenly worse, and sent for Mary Woodville, who set out instantly and took with her Doctor Patterson, of Fincastle, but before they arrived she was struggling with death. She died with all the firmness of a Christian hero, firmly relying on the merits and mediation of an all-sufficient Saviour, and declared that her hope and confidence were so great that death presented not one solitary terror to her, but rather that he appeared to her as a friend who was to conduct her out of this into a far better world that she had long looked forward to with ardor—and called on her relations and friends around her to witness with what composure a real Christian could die, and actually closed her eyes with her own hands.
The family are now dispersed, and the house locked up and the plantation forsaken for awhile.
Sarah, Lynn and Thomas are at Mr. Woodville’s, Ben and Polly down at Mr. Massie’s. What future disposition will be made of them or the property is not yet decided on. She did not make a will.
My wife is very sick and confined to her bed with something like the nettle-rash. Sarah is well and I am in my general health.
Your affectionate brother,
John Preston.
To Mrs. Elizabeth Madison, Montgomery Co.
30 From this branch of the Peytons are also descended Mrs. J. M. Ranson, of Jefferson county, W. Va., Captain William L. Clark, of Winchester, Va., Mrs. R. T. W. Duke, of Albemarle, the late Judge J. E. Brown, of Wythe, Mrs. Hunter McGuire, of Richmond, Mrs. Robert Gibson, of Cincinnati, and many others of worth and distinction in Virginia, the South and West.—R. A. B. in Richmond Standard.
31 Edward Everett’s Oration on Washington.