Thanks, Janet.  Senator William Pitt Kellogg (R-LA) served until
1872, when he was elevated (the election process was so
complicated that elevated seems the appropriate verb) to the
Governorship.)
  Tennessee had a fairly prominent readjuster movement, but
Virginia's centrality in the politics of debt readjustment was caused
by the withdrawal of the western counties to form the State of West
Virginia.  No other state experienced that kind of reduction of its
debt "collateral."

Harold

Date sent:              Wed, 09 May 2001 08:57:54 -0400 (EDT)
From:                   Janet Hunter <[log in to unmask]>
Subject:                Re: READJUSTERS --Stovall/Smith/Politics/Richmond/1880
To:                     [log in to unmask]
Send reply to:          Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history
        <[log in to unmask]>

> I want to thank Harold, John and Liz for their responses to my initial
> query regarding the Readjusters.  I have looked around some, and it is my
> impression that this was primarily a Virginia phenomenon, or at least name
> for a political faction.
>
> I am wondering if this is correct.  The reason I ask is that I came across
> the article on the Smith-Stovall affair while tracking a U.S. Senate
> "seduction" scandal involving Senator Benjamin Harvey Hill of Georgia (and
> first cousin of my gg grandfather), a Democrat and Chairman of the
> critical Elections Committee that had the power to declare a member not
> duly-elected.  His Congressional bio is here:
> http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=H000587
>
> He claimed that his political opponents "hired" a Mr. Kellogg's
> ex-mistress to claim she had fathered a child by him.  The implication is
> that Mr. Kellog is from Georgia.  I also find a Republican U.S. Senator
> William Kellog from Louisiana at the same time.   (I will insert the
> day-by-day account of the affair, as much as I have had time to go through
> the papers.  It may be of interest from a "nothing ever changes" point of
> view to some of you.)
>
> I am curious if anyone knows whether Georgia had a similar political
> phenomenon that might have been a part of Senator Hill's, who had been a
> Georgia political figure for 30 years,troubles.
>
> Best Regards,  Janet (Baugh) Hunter
>
> Articles March 3-April 17, 1880, Regarding Senator Benjamin Harvey Hill of
> GA. Appearing in the "Alexandria Gazette And Virginia Advertiser"
> Published Daily (evening) and Tri-weekly by Edgar Snowden.
>
> EXCEPT March 7 Article from the Atlanta Constitution, from Jackie Bowers
>
> MARCH 3 –
>
> #1 – (News of the Day.)
>
> A long threatened suit for seduction against Senator Ben Hill, of Georgia,
> was entered yesterday.  The plaintiff is Miss Jessie Raymond, a young
> woman 23 years of age.  She claims $10,000 damages.  In her declaration
> Miss Raymond alleges that in November 1877, the defendant committed the
> offense complained of, and the result of his visits to her was the birth
> of a child in August 1878.
>
> #2 - (From Washington.)
>
> Senator Hill utterly denies and scouts the charges brought in the suit
> instituted in the Criminal Court here against him for seduction, and the
> case is generally supposed to be one of blackmail.
>
> MARCH 4 - (From Washington.)
>
> There are two stories afloat to day with regard to the latest Senatorial
> scandal – one to the effect that Mr. Hill is to prosecute Mrs. Lockwood
> to the full extent of the law, and will commence it by moving to have her
> disbarred from practicing in the courts here for complicity in an attempt
> at blackmail; and the other, that Mr. Hill having paid Mrs. Raymond, the
> complainant, $500 to publish a public denial of the charge, and that the
> lady having failed to pay Mrs. Lockwood the fee she had promised her, the
> latter had instituted proceedings to collect it.
>
> MARCH 7 -  (Atlanta Constitution – Condensed Politics)
>
> The lull in the Simmons business was taken advantage of by a disreputable
> woman from Georgia to make an attempt to blackmail Senator Hill.  As you
> have been advised, the Senator did not 'scare' and the blackmailers beat a
> hasty retreat.  It is until? that Sen. Hill will have Mrs. ?. Lockwood,
> the female lawyer who induced the woman to begin the suit, indicted, as
> well as one or two other parties here who conspired to make the blackmail
> a success. Sen. Hill was congratulated by a number of senators on his
> firmness in ? a cent.  He said he would spend ? dollars in prosecuting the
> blackmailers, but would not give a nickel to stop the suit.  Senators are
> frequently made targets by the class of people, who think they will give
> money rather than bear a scandal.  This scandal was short-lived, ? in its
> infancy, branded a base attempt to extort money.  The suit will be
> withdrawn.
>
> MARCH 8 - (From Washington.)
>
> The Journal of the Senate has been examined and from it is ascertained the
> fact that at the very time Mrs. Raymond charges Mr Hill with being in
> Atlanta he was here in attendance upon his duties as Senator.
>
> MARCH 14 - (From Washington.)
>
> It was currently reported in the Capitol this morning that the Hill
> scandal was to be alluded to in the Senate, and notwithstanding the
> inclemency of the weather the pruriant curiosity of many of both sexes led
> them to be present at the scene they had expected to witness.  Mr. Hill,
> however, had no such expectation, and was in the Supreme Court at 2
> o’clock, when this letter was written.
>
> (Note:  I found nothing regarding a Senate reference that the scandal was
> alluded to.)
>
> MARCH 19 - (From Washington.)
>
> Miss Horton and Miss Raymond were both at the Capitol yesterday afternoon,
> the former looking for Senator Morgan’s son, and the latter for Senator
> Hill, but as neither of them was at all belligerent, though shadowed by
> the police, they were not interfered with, and were allowed to pursue the
> even tenor of their devious way.
>
> (Note:  I don’t know who Miss Horton would, but this could be a separate
> scandal.  The name didn’t really register with me when I was looking at
> the microfilm, but my interest was piqued by the name HORTON, as I have
> some PA>NC>TN Quaker Hortons.  I went to politicalgraveyard .com and found
> a Senator John Tyler Morgan, of Selma AL, who was a Senator at the
> time….http://politicalgraveyard.com/bio/morgan.html)
>
> MARCH 23 - (From Washington.)
>
> Miss Horton and Miss Raymond, the latter accompanied with a baby, were at
> the Capitol to day, the former sitting in the Marble room and the latter
> in the ladies gallery, in full view of Mr. Hill, who was occupying his
> seat on the floor, and who did not appear annoyed in the least by her
> presence.  Indeed he remarked laughingly to some of his colleagues sitting
> near him, "Every old woman in the gallery has her glasses pointing at me,
> and is saying to her friends, ‘Who’d a thought it.’"  But Miss
> Raymond was not allowed to retain her seat long, for the captain of the
> Capitol police soon approached and informed her that babies were not
> allowed admittance to the galleries, and that she must take her’s away.
> This she did, and as she led the child through the corridors, she was
> followed by a large crowd of men gossips – the worst sort in the world
> – who closely inspected her and the infant.  The constant presence of
> these women at the Capitol is now supposed to be induced by means employed
> by the enemies of Mr. Hill, for no wronged woman, anxious to do right and
> to regain the estimation of their friends, would resort to such a course
> as they are pursuing.  If it is as supposed, their action is producing a
> directly contrary effect, for they are now scandalizing the Senate of the
> U.S., and, in consequence, are being severely censured, not only by Mr.
> Hill’s friends, but by the better class of his political enemies, and
> are evoking a sympathy for him which otherwise might not be manifested.
>
> MARCH 24 - (Editorial)
>
> Senator Benjamin H. Hill has made affidavit to the effect that he never
> saw Miss Raymond but once in his life, and then only for a few minutes in
> a law office in Atlanta and in the presence of two other lawyers.  He has
> sworn before God and man that the charge she brings against him is false.
> As Mr. Hill is a Senator of the United States, as those who know him at
> home, his neighbors, look upon him as an honorable man, and as the only
> possible excuse for a false oath, the preservation of a woman’s honor,
> does not apply in this case, there is no sufficient reason for doubting
> that he tells the truth.  This being so, the annoyance of the scandal to
> which himself, his family and the Senate of the United States are daily
> subjected by his brazen-faced accuser is a great shame, and some means
> should be devised for putting a stop to its continuance.  The rules of
> propriety as well as those of law should be enforced by the police of
> Washington, and to say that she is committing no breach of the peace is
> not a good reason for permitting her to follow Mr. Hill about, at the
> instance of his political enemies, and annoying him as she has been doing
> for the past month.
>
> MARCH 26 - (New of the Day)
>
> Miss Jessie Raymond, the young woman who has been haunting Senator Hill,
> settled her board bill at the Washington House, in Washington, yesterday,
> and taking her infant left the city for parts unknown.  The papers in the
> suit entered by Mrs. Lockwood for Miss Raymond are still on file, but
> unless the plaintiff makes her appearance at the proper time the will
> amount to nothing.
>
> APRIL 7 – (News of the Day)
>
> When the Hill-Raymond seduction case was called in the Washington Circuit
> court yesterday, counsel for Senator Hill asked that the case be struck
> from the docket, as it had been brought against the protest of its
> plaintiff, Miss Raymond, whereupon Mrs. Lawyer Lockwood, who had not been
> notified of the case, appeared and made affidavit that she had not
> protested against bringing the case.
>
> APRIL  13 – (From Washington.)
>
> Now that it has been decided by the court that the suit brought against
> Senator Hill by Mrs. Lockwood for the seduction of Miss Raymond shall be
> tried, the gossips are reveling in expectation of the developments of the
> trial, which it is supposed, will commence in about two weeks.  In any
> other court of the country the suit would have been dismissed and Mrs.
> Lockwood been disbarred from practicing for instituting it, but the ways
> of the courts in Washington, like those of some others, are past finding
> out.
>
>
> APRIL 16 - (From Washington.)
>
> Senator Ben Hill has published a letter in the Augusta Constitutionalist
> to which he asseverates his innocence of the recent charges brought
> against him, and says he has reason to believe they were instigated by
> certain members of his own political party in George who are jealous of
> him and that they employed Mr. Kellogg's ex mistress as one of their
> instruments effecting the object of their conspiracy.
>
> APRIL 17 – MAY 14.  Stay tuned.  I have gone through the Gazette for
> this period and have not found anything further.  That’s as far as I
> got.
>
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