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October 6-8, 1864

October, THURSDAY 6, 1864.

Saturday if noth happins home all the morning in the afternoon i went up to Mrs sanders i spent quite a Plesent time i had tom gentelmen to

FRIDAY, 7.

gallant me home little Alex was my main gallant clear the first morning we have since i have bin here had Chester and i were out  walking after i

SATURDAY, 8.

went to spencers spent quite a Plesent time lovely day i stoped at Mrs burkes and Chesters i started for home about 2 […]  at 6 in the evening we all went to see the torch light Procesion

Annotation 1

On October 7, 1864 the North American and United States Gazette announced a torchlit procession to be held the following day.

The National Union Party, the party of Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson in the presidential election of 1864, held a large torchlight rally in Independence Square on Saturday night, October 8, 1864.  The in an October 10, 1864 article titled “Union Meeting and Torchlight Procession,” the Public Ledger noted that in addition to former Pennsylvania Governor Johnson and Philadelphia Mayor Henry the rally was attended by “ladies in large numbers.”  The torchlight procession through Philadelphia must have been reminiscent of the marches led and organized by the political clubs such as the Wide Awake prior to the election of 1860.  In his remarks, Mayor Henry stated that the issue before the nation was “between manhood and dishonor,” and went on to call to mind the recently destroyed Pennsylvania city of Chambersburg at the hands of Confederate General Jubal Early in late July of that year.  Henry’s parting words purportedly elicited great cheers from the Philadelphia crowd: “Pennsylvania, if needs be, will cast every ton of her iron hills into the thunderbolts of a just war, but from this time henceforth, not one ounce of her rich ore shall be forged into the brands for manacles for enslaved humanity.”

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