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Gerrit Smith (March 6,1797-December 28,1874), who was born in Utica, New York, became very wealthy and owned extensive real estate. His home was in Peterboro, New York. According to Walter M. Merrill, as stated in the third volume of The Letters of William Lloyd Garrison, Smith "was one of the most generous philanthropists of his day" (III 10). He contributed to a number of reform movements and organizations of which abolition, a cause that he had first joined in the 1830s, was one. He had joined the abolitionist cause in the 1830s (V 33). When Frederick Douglass' paper, the North Star, ran into serious financial problems, Smith merged Douglass' paper with his own Liberty Party Paper, the resulting publication being known as Frederick Douglass' Paper (Sterling 273).

Smith had been one of the founders of the Liberty Party, and it was he who gave it its name (Kraditor 141). He was elected on an abolitionist ticket to the House of Representatives in 1852 (Frost 422). However, he resigned his office before the end of his term, apparently disillusioned by the discovery that he could not do much toward the abolition of slavery while in Congress (Sterling 282). More conservative than Garrison, he had at first hoped that political action would end slavery. Now that he was convinced that such action was not succeeding, he decided that violence would be necessary. Even before his stint in office, he had become involved in more aggressive action against slavery, being one of a group of abolitionists who in the fall of 1851 had rescued a slave from U.S. Marshals, seizing him from a courthouse in Syracuse and taking him to Canada (Sterling 281).

John Brown visited Smith in Peterboro, New York, in February of 1858; and the philanthropist promised to give support to his plan (Merrill V 33).

Brown, who is believed to have been a student at Greersburg Academy in Darlington, Pennsylvania (Bausman 816), felt that he had a moral mandate to kill and be killed for the cause (Bailyn 637). On October 16, 1859, he and twenty followers, both black and white and all heavily armed, captured part of the Harper's Ferry, Virginia, federal arsenal, hoping to rouse slaves to rebel and to provide an asylum for fugitives. He and his men held out for two days, but then they surrendered to federal troops. Brown was tried and hanged on charges of conspiracy, treason, and murder (636); but the raid showed Southerners that many in the North really wanted what John Brown had died for (637).

After this raid Gerrit Smith, as a result of public criticism of his support for Brown in the Harper's Ferry venture, suffered a mental breakdown that lasted for several months (Merrill V 33).

It is interesting to note that despite differences on the issues of political involvement and resistance, the anti-political and nonresistant Garrisonians and Garrison himself continued to be friendly with Smith (Rachames IV 202 n).

Gerrit Smith aided the Union during the Civil War, campaigned for Lincoln in 1864 and for Grant in 1868, and favored a moderate Reconstruction policy. He was one of the people who signed a bail bond for release of Jefferson Davis (33). He served as a delegate to the Republican National Convention in 1872 (Frost 422).

In addition to his support of abolition, Smith worked for strict observance of the Sabbath, prohibition, women's suffrage (His daughter Elizabeth designed the famous bloomer dress and Elizabeth Cady Stanton was his cousin), and prison and dress reform. He also opposed the use of tobacco (Webster 626; Frost 422).

Of the activists who wrote to Milo, Gerrit Smith's handwriting is the most difficult to decipher.

Smith's first letter to Milo is simply a thank-you note.

Letter 138

from Gerrit Smith

Peterboro, New York Oct 2d 1853

Milo A. Townsend

My D Sir

On my return home after a weeks absence I find your interesting and beautiful letter among scores of letters on my table. I regret that I have not time to give it a proper answer.

I thank you for the "Political Guide." I hope that I may ere long find it in my power to spend an hour over it.

Please remember me to Mrs. Cote´1.

Your friend

Gerrit Smith

1Emma Cote´, to whom Smith refers in letters 138 and 5, was the daughter of Dr. H.H. Sherwood of New York and at one time a resident of Pittsburgh (Scrapbook II 127). She was among Milo Townsend's correspondents.

In the same scrapbook is an article by Milo in which he reported that Emma Cote´ had died on Staten Island in the winter of 1855. He states that "she was beautiful,... tall,... and noble in her courage" (Scrapbook II 127).

For more on Emma Cote´ see the Association/Fourierism section of chapter 25.

It would appear that Milo had written to Smith requesting aid for some cause or person. In his answer below Smith expressed regret that he could not help.

Letter 5 f

from Gerrit Smith

Peterboro, Feb 10 1856

My dear friend

The mail which brings me your beautiful and welcome letter buries me up in letters. So my reply must be brief.

You will be surprised to hear that so innumerable are the applicants for my help, I am obliged to disappoint 99/100 of them. I must disappoint you too. Just now I am doing what I can for our poor Westerners in Kansas1. I should rejoice could I send them ten times as much money as I can.

So dear Mrs Cote´ has passed on to a better world! I wish I had known more of her.

Tell Mr. Bradford, of whom you speak, I have confirmed I have a very high opinion of him.

I am glad that you as well as he are interested in the first Forum [?] wins [?] of the Constitution--

The election of Bundy [?] is pleasant but it does not cheer me as it does you. We will assume nothing unless the Republican Party takes higher ground immediately.

I hope you will be at Pittsburgh 22nd next and do all you can to induce the convention to plant itself on the ground that slavery can not be legalized-- I cannot be there.

I send you a copy of my letter to Geo. Chane [?].

Truly yours

Gerrit Smith

Milo A. Townsend

P.S. I send you a few more copies of my letter to Chane [?] Do put them into the hands of members of the convention at Pittsburgh--

1The Kansas-Nebraska Act, which became law on May 30, 1854, repealed the 1820 Missouri Compromise and permitted settlers in the region to decide for themselves on the question of slavery. In Kansas, which began to be referred to as "bleeding Kansas," this right of choice led to years of guerrilla warfare between the pro-slavery and the anti-slavery factions (Sterling 292).

The following letter is the last from Gerrit Smith. It is also the most illegible.

Letter 46

from Gerrit Smith

Peterboro April 13, 1862

Milo A. Townsend

Dear Friend

I have just now read your interesting letter.

Dear Father Howells! I knew him well and to know him well was to love him greatly.

I regret to learn of the straitened circumstances of his family and of the state of health of his widow. I wish I could send them $50. Beside my table are the applicants for my help and [?] I have to disappoint 49/50 of them. I can give but a trifle where I would be glad to give much. Please send her the enclosed ... [?] draft [?] 10 [?] & my love along with it.

What you write of our guilty and unhappy country is well said. The slaves will go free-- but the distresses of our country are far from ended - The penalties of her enormous crimes against the poor are far from exhausted--

In haste

Your friend

Gerrit Smith

Milo received, or at least preserved, no further letters from Gerrit Smith.

In The Battle for Bread Milo wrote of Gerrit Smith as "one of the few of nature's millionaire noblemen, and benefactors of his race-- the truly Honorable Gerrit Smith."