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Carrington and the Golden Circle Legend in Indiana During the Civil War

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Carrington and the Golden Circle Legend in Indiana During the Civil War Carrington and the Golden Circle Legend in Indiana during the Civil War Frank L. Klenzent" Indiana contributed more than any other state to the building of the legend that the Knights of the Golden Circle, as a subversive society, existed in the upper Middle West during the Civil War years. No one in Indiana made as great a contribution to the Golden Circle fantasy as Henry B. Carrington, onetime politician, soldier, and man of letters. When Governor Oliver P. Morton appointed Carrington, in midyear of 1862, to speed up the recruitment and organiza- tion of Indiana troops, the ex-Ohioan could look back upon an active and checkered career. He had practiced law in Columbus, Ohio, with considerable success. He had dabbled in the study of military tactics, contributing a guide on regula- tions and troop maneuvers. He had become an avowed aboli- tionist and had helped to bring the Republican party into being in Ohio. Then, when William Dennison had become governor of Ohio, he had named Carrington, a onetime law partner, as his adjutant general. The highhanded tactics of the two created considerable resentment and also ruffled the feelings of the Secretary of War.= Carrington defied the orders of Secretary Simon Cameron, for he organized more regiments than Ohio's quota early in 1861. When David Tod replaced Dennison in the governor's chair early in 1862, Carrington sought an army commission; and he received the colonelcy of the Eighteenth Regiment, United States troops. Shortly thereafter, Governor Morton secured the services of Colonel Carrington; and he came to Indianapolis to a desk and a duty.e *Frank L. Klement is Professor of History at Marquette Uni- versity, Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He is the author of Copperheads in the Aliddle West and various articles. 1William T. Coggeshall Diary, June 1 and 16, 1861, Coggeshall Collection, Ohio Historical Society, Columbus; U.S., War Department, The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies (128 vols., Washington, 1880-1901), Ser. 1, Vol. XXIII, Part 2, p. 193. Hereafter The War of the Rebellion will be cited as Official Records. *No satisfactory study of Carrington exists. "Henry Beebee Car- rington," Dictioncvry of American Biography (20 vols., New York, 1928- 1937), 111, 621, is sketchy and incomplete. The Henry B. Carrington Papers, Archives Division, Indiana State Library, Indianapolis, include a bound volume of items selected and collected to justify his Indiana career; included are some letter-press books. 32 Indiana Magazine of History Even before Carrington came to Indiana, stories of Golden Circle activity had circulated throughout the country. War psychosis enabled the gullible to see fact in fiction and to build mountains out of molehills. Tales of Golden Circle ac- tivity dated back to the prewar years and revolved around the name of George W. L. Bickley, charlatan extraordinary and whimsical wanderer. Bickley drifted to Cincinnati in the early 1850’s and used his glib tongue and a facile pen to try tours as lawyer, lecturer, doctor, editor, and promoter. He married a widow and lost favor when he tried to transfer her property into his own name. Then, in 1859, he served as mid- wife to the Knights of the Golden Circle, bringing the organi- zation into being with his pen and his imagination, and hoping to pyramid a fortune out of ten-dollar membership fees. He devised a ritual and n great seal, appropriated the title of “General,” and published copies of a booklet entitled Rules, Regulations, and Principles of the K.G.C. (New York, 1859) .3 He announced that the Golden Circle would “colonize and finally annex northern Mexico to the Dominion of the United States.”* Early in 1859 Bickley left Cincinnati, eluding his credi- tors and skedaddling out of town on a midnight train. He sought K.G.C. membership fees and publicity for his filibuster- ing fantasy in New York, Washington, and Baltimore. He drifted to Richmond, Atlanta, and New Orleans, getting sym- pathy but no followers or funds for his scheme ultimately to annex Mexico and impose “the superior Anglo-American civilization” upon her. He next drifted to Texas and found some gullible Texans who took the roving windbag seriously.6 The filibustering scheme, however, collapsed because of lack BBickley contradicted himself nearly every time he put pen to paper or spoke for publication, so every statement of his should be questioned. The Bickley story can be reconstructed, in part, from the George W. L. Bickley Papers, War Department Records, National Archives, Washington ; Bickley’s “own story” as reported in the Colum- bus, Ohio, Crisis, Dec. 30, 1863; the Bickley letters in the John Nicolay- John Hay Papers, Illinois State Historical Library, Springfield; and the exposks in the Louisville Daily Journal, July 18, 1861, and in the Cincinnati Daily Gazette, Aug. 6, 1863. Also see Ollinger Crenshaw, “The Knights of the Golden Circle: the Career of George Bickley,” American Historical Review, XLVII (Oct., 1941), 23-60. 4 George W. L. Bickley, “Statement of Facts,” Aug. 8, 1863, Bickley Papers. 6 Jimmie Hicks (ed.), “Some Letters Concerning the Knights of the Golden Circle in Texas, 1860-61,” Southwestern Histom’cal Quarterly, LXV (July, 1961), 80-86. Cctrrington und the Golden Circle Legend 33 of funds and followers, and the garrulous pretender set his feet in motion again. As secession sentiment swept the South, Bickley waved his wand and tried to transform his paper-based society into an organization dedicated to repelling a Yankee invasion and guaranteeing Southern rights. He drifted toward Tennessee, taking his daydreams and a packet of clippings with him. While “General” Bickley tramped and talked in the south- west, mmormongers in the North began to build the Golden Circle legend. Jittery Washington residents heard reports that a Southern-based secret society might seize the capital city and prevent Lincoln’s inauguration. The Knights of the Golden Circle received top billing. A congressional inquiry found no basis for the rumors, and the committee report allayed the ill-founded fears.c The next set of K.G.C. rumors emanated from Kentucky, where an apprehensive electorate awaited the August, 1861, elections while the state tried to maintain a policy of neu- trality. Bickley, who had reached Clarksville, Tennessee, by middune, tried to promote both his and K.G.C. aspirations by issuing a circular entitled “Volunteers Wanted” and offering to accept Kentucky volunteers for a proposed “In- dependent Corps”-troops which might double as soldiers and Knights. “It is,” Bickley wrote from Tennessee, “exceed- ingly desirable and important to organize the State of Ken- tucky before the August elections. .”7 The Kentucky legislature dignified Bickley’s aspirations with an investiga- tion,8 and the self-styled “General,” pleased with the free publicity, countered with an open letter claiming a state- wide membership of eight thousand K.G.C.’s in KentuckyQ- another of the many falsehoods fashioned by the wandering windbag. ~ 6 U.S.,House of Representatives, House Report No. 79, 36 Cong., 2 Sess., 1860-1861, pp. 5, 45. 7 “Volunteers Wanted” (dated “Headquarters, American Legion, K.G.C.,” Clarksville, Tennessee, June 29, 1861), circular quoted in the Dr. A. A. Urban expos6 of the Golden Circle in the Louisville Daily Jozirnal, July 18, 1861. 8 Kentucky, Journal of the Called Session of the House of Re- presentatives of the Commonwealth of Kentucky (Frankfort, 1861), 138; Kentucky, Senate Journal (Frankfort, 1861), 146. 9 Clipping from Louisville Daily Journal (n. d.), letter to editors, June 6, 1861, Bickley Papers. 34 Indiana Magazine of History Three expos&, all depicting the Golden Circle as a traitor- ous organization, appeared in short order. The first, claiming to be the work of a former “Governor General” of the Golden Circle in Kentucky, bore a Cincinnati copyright; and the pamphlet sold like hot cakes at twenty-five cents a copy.’O An Indianapolis Democrat, Dr. J. AT. Hiatt, wrote another “as- tounding disclosure,” also pretending he had been a member of the K.G.C.” The third exposQ,the work of Dr. A. A. Urban, appeared in the columns of the Louisville and it credited the K.G.C. with an influence and importance in Ken- tucky which it never had. The three expositions, broadcast over the upper Midwest, made the Knights of the Golden Circle a household term and established the foundation upon which politicians in Indiana, Illinois, and Ohio could build air castles. The appearance of John C. Brain in Indiana in September, 1861, gave further publicity to the Knights of the Golden Circle. Brain, another quixotic rover, had swindled parties in Pittsburgh and Chicago before trying to ply his trade in Laporte County, Indiana. One of Brain’s many claims was that he was a K.G.C. agent with the duty of securing revolvers and volunteers for the Southern army. He also claimed that the United States had ceased to exist, so he favored establish- ing a monarchy, “like in France.” Excited Laporte citizens, unaware that Brain was more fool than traitor, appealed to authorities; and a federal marshal arrested the idle babbler in Michigan City. Newspapers featured headlines that a prominent Golden Circle member had been arrested, but the officials soon realized the prisoner was a fellow of mischie- vous bent and low mentality.”’ 10 J. W. Pomfrey, A True Disclosure and ExpositiorL of the Knights of the Golden Circle, Including the Secret Signs, Grips, and Charges, of the Third Degree as Practiced bg the Order (Cincinnati, 1861). 11 [Dr. J. M. Hiatt], An Authentic Exposition of the Knights of the Golden Circle: A Histoyl of Secession from 1834 to 1861 by a Member of the Order (Indianapolis, 1861).
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