The nation still
lives, and the people are just as free to avoid social intimacy with the
blacks as ever they were, or as they are with white people.
While living in Galena I was nominally only a clerk supporting myself
and family on a stipulated salary. In reality my position was
different. My father had never lived in Galena himself, but had
established my two brothers there, the one next younger than myself in
charge of the business, assisted by the youngest. When I went there it
was my father's intention to give up all connection with the business
himself, and to establish his three sons in it: but the brother who had
really built up the business was sinking with consumption, and it was
not thought best to make any change while he was in this condition. He
lived until September, 1861, when he succumbed to that insidious disease
which always flatters its victims into the belief that they are growing
better up to the close of life. A more honorable man never transacted
business. In September, 1861, I was engaged in an employment which
required all my attention elsewhere.
During the eleven months that I lived in Galena prior to the first call
for volunteers, I had been strictly attentive to my business, and had
made but few acquaintances other than customers and people engaged in
the same line with myself.
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