Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume VII.djvu/640

 628 GARRISON princes visited the retired actor, and Hannah More here passed many agreeable hours. His later years were filled with suffering. The gout and gravel, to which he had long been subject, returned upon him with increasing severity. He was buried on Feb. 1, 1779, be- neath the monument of Shakespeare. His talents were singularly versatile. He wrote farces and comic pieces, conversed well, and was a member of the literary club. He suc- ceeded in every kind of acting. His comic turn led him to delight in broad farces, in feats of dexterity, and ludicrous transformations. As Hamlet he filled his audience with horror and melancholy ; as Lear he rose to the height of tragic power. He was of middle size, delicate in form, and quick in movement, wanting that dignity of appearance which has distinguished so many other actors. His memory, too, some- times failed him, and he would repeat a line be- fore he could recover himself. But his voice was melodious and clear, his countenance ani- mated, and his sensitive temperament, even in his silence, governed the spectator. His thrills of feeling communicated themselves by look, gesture, and position. He was somewhat vain, but good-humored and placable, and a kind friend. In spite of a certain want of dignity in his manners, and a constant affectation, he was respected and liked. See "Life of Gar- rick," by P. Fitzgerald (2 vols., London, 1868). GARRISON, William Lloyd, an American abo- litionist, born in Newburyport, Mass., Dec. 12, 1804. His parents were natives of the prov- ince of New Brunswick. His father, Abijah Garrison, was master of a vessel engaged in the West India trade, and a man of some lite- rary ability and taste ; but he became intem- perate, and abandoned his family while his children were young. The mother, left in ut- ter poverty, became a professional nurse, and in 1814 went to Lynn. William was at first apprenticed to a shoemaker, but afterward sent to school at Newburyport, partly sup- porting himself by aiding a wood sawyer. In 1815 he went with his mother to Baltimore, where he remained a year in the capacity of an errand boy, and then returned to Newbury- port. In 1818 he was indentured to Ephraim W. Allen, editor of the " Newburyport Her- ald," to learn the art of printing, and when only 16 or 17 years of age began to write up- on political and other topics for the "Herald," carefully preserving his incognito, and once received through the post office a letter of thanks from his master, with a request that he would continue to write. He soon com- menced writing also for other journals, and a series of articles which he wrote for the " Sa- lem Gazette," under the signature of " Aristi- des," attracted much attention in political cir- cles. In 1826 he became the proprietor and editor of a journal in his native town, called the "Free Press," which proved unsuccessful. He then worked for a time as a journeyman in Boston. In 1827 he became the editor of the "National Philanthropist" in that city, the first journal ever established to advocate the cause of "total abstinence;" and in 1828 he joined a friend in the publication of the "Jour- nal of the Times" at Bennington, Vt. This journal supported John Quincy Adams for the presidency, and was in part devoted to peace, temperance, anti-slavery, and other reforms; but it failed to receive an adequate support. During his residence in Bennington he pro- duced considerable excitement upon the subject of slavery, not only in that place but through- out the state, in consequence of which there was transmitted to congress an anti-slavery memorial more numerously signed than any similar paper previously submitted to tbat body. Benjamin Lundy, an advocate of the gradual abolition of slavery, was then engaged in pub- lishing the " Genius of Universal Emancipa- tion " at Baltimore. He had met Mr. Garrison during the previous year in Boston, and re- ceived from him timely assistance in bringing his cause to the notice of the people of that city. Wishing for a coadjutor, he went to Ben- nington and engaged Mr. Garrison to join him in the editorship of his journal. On July 4, 1829, Mr. Garrison delivered in Park street church, Boston, an address which excited gen- eral attention by the boldness and vigor of its assault upon slavery. In the autumn he began his labors in Baltimore as joint editor with Mr. Lundy of the " Genius of Universal Emancipa- tion," and in the first number issued under his supervision he made a distinct avowal of the doctrine of immediate emancipation as the right of the slave and the duty of the master. Mr. Lundy did not concur with him in this doc- trine, but as each of them appended his initials to his articles, the difference interposed no bar- rier to hearty cooperation. The journal, by its bold and uncompromising tone, produced con- siderable excitement among the supporters of slavery, while Mr. Garrison's denunciations of the colonization society aroused the hostility of some who, upon other grounds, were inclined to sympathize with him. An event soon oc- curred which resulted in a dissolution of his connection with the paper. The ship Francis, owned by Francis Todd of Newburyport, hav- ing taken a cargo of slaves from Baltimore to Louisiana, Mr. Garrison denounced the act as a "domestic piracy," and declared his purpose to "cover with thick infamy" all those impli- cated therein. Baltimore being then the seat of an extensive domestic traffic in slaves, his denunciation produced a great deal of feeling, and he was in consequence indicted and con- victed, in the city court, May term, 1830, for " a gross and malicious libel " against the own- er and master of the Francis, and sentenced to pay a fine of $50 and costs of court. Being unable to discharge the judgment, he was committed to jail. Mr. Todd, in a civil suit for damages, subsequently obtained a verdict against him for $1,000; but the judgment, probably on account of his well known pover-