WRITINGS OF SAi\'l HOUSTON, 1822
125
to ask you, upon what evidence you have thought proper to pro- mulgate a charge so disreputable in its substance, extensive in its application, and positive in its terms. I am, sir, &c. &c. SAM HOUSTON. [Addressed]: Chapman Johnson,3 Esq: Richmond, Va. 1 Niles Rcgiste1·, XXXV ( 1828-1829), 139-140. ~The asterisk is in the source, and the note appended is as follows: "The agonizing abhorence which Mr. Johnson has conceived against the 'stories' is deplorable. Those who did no~ know something of him, would suppose from his antipathy to 'stories,' that he had just broke from a nursery, after hearing a recital of the dreadful 'STORY' of 'RAW HEAD AND BLOODY BONES!' Good gentlemen, he means well! The Woolsack and Ermine would alarm him much less than these sad 'stories.'" 3 See Houston to Colonel John Campbell, February 20, 1828.
To CHAPMAN JoHNsoN 1
Nashville, Tenn. 14th May, 1828 Sir: My absence from home for sometime, during which your letter of the 20th March last arrived, has prevented my replying at an earlier day. I am not dissatisfied that the manner of my address should have met your approbation; nor would I have you to suppose for one moment, that my object in addressing you had been to induce a departure from that rule of conduct which you had prescribed to yourself in relation to controversies, which are not permitted by your avocations-however _they may have been induced by the responsible attitude in which you stood to the anti-Jackson con- vention, and the address reported by you, so obnoxious in the part to which' I have referred in my first letter. I will not disguise my astonishment at the manner in which you have thought proper to treat the interrogatory which was presented to you, to know "upon what evidence you had thought proper to promulgate a charge so disreputable," &c. As the in- quiry was plain and intelligible, and in which truth was con- cerned, so far as it affected individuals, or related to the com- munity, or the authors of the address, I had a right to look for from you that frankness an.d candor which one gentleman has a right to expect from another, and ,,vhich can never be departed from without a violation of sincerity and good faith. Instead of affording the information requested, you inform me, that the portion of the address to which I called your attention,
Powered by FlippingBook