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I.V
THE
GREAT AMERICAN BATTLE;
OR, THE CONTEST BETWEEN
CHRISTIANITY AND POLITICAL ROMANISM.
BY
ANNA ELLA CAEEOLL,
\
OF MARYLAND,
• The name of Ajierjca must ahvaj's exalt the just pride of patriotism."
WASniNGTON's Farewell Address.
NEW YORK AND AUBURjST:
MILLEE, OETON & MULLIGAN.
New York : 25 Park Ro-w.— ArRURX : 107 Gkxesee St.
1856.
THE NEW
PUBLIC LIB.,..:,
ASTOR, lENOX
T(LDEN FOUNDATIONS.
1699.
Entered ac'";ordlng to Act of Congress, in the year Ono Thousand Eight Hundred
and Tifty-aix, by
FKEDEEICK S. WINSTON,
In the Clerk s Office of the District Court for the Southern Didrict of New York.
E. O. JENKINS,
No. 2G Feankpoet Street.
PREFACE.
" 0, say 1 does the Star-Spanglod Banner yot wave,
O'or the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave?"
What a burst of life and principle does the very name of America
introduce ! — bubbling- with ever-springing sap, and glorying in the
fact that her anatomy is before us.
The land for which generation after generation have spent their
substance, their energy, and their virtue — which contains the
bones of their dead, who died for it — their savings and their nour-
ishment.
And when influences deep, palpable, and universal, are striving
with marked celerity to arrest her chief work, it is not wonderful
she should feel it. Glorious movement, what heart shall not re-
spond to it ? The hand that guides this light is a Divine one — it is
none other than the hand of God.
America has done, and is doing, the world's work, in establishing
the only true principles of liberty the world has ever known. If
she is thus important to universal man, how much more so to
America ? Alone with her blood she has watered the tree that she
planted ; and it has flourished because of its closeness to the root
from which it sprouted.
Our lives, our country, our homes, our hearts — this sympathy
and love constitute the genius, the wealth, and the strength of
America.
(8)
IV PREFACE.
She will never be pardoned for the exhibition of this sparkling
liberty, which attempts to give the world freedom. She started
with blood-stained energy, and incorruptible virtue, and must be
solid and constant as the globe. For Americans the first country
must be America — the second, America — all, America ! Our first
and last motto is, Hope !
The balanced moment has come, and in the language of expiring
faith, let us call out for light, more light. Lord. We are sustain-
ing the greatest weight ever laid on human life. And who that
has caught but the feeblest ray of this liberty is willing to re-
nounce it ?
The American spirit must imbue the American sentiment, and
the goal should be fixed before the starting-point is taken, by all
who press American soil. To give life and durability, which shall
implant, by education, the country in the heart of the child, is the
means at America's command for her salvation. And America, to
be saved thus, must be saved in her infancy. Before the child in-
creases and enlarges, it must exist. This is the inspiration of the
American mind ; and believing God had raised this independent
Nation upon which to foster his own glorious Truth, let man from
his birth recognize Him in his own beloved country. Who by
origin and adoption is in her— is of her — is enshrined in her, must
live and die in her.
America has a mission to teach the world, in her language, her
history, and her laws. Her great heart and soul were found in a
feeble body, which gave it independence — it was the instinct, the
inspiration, the energy, which made the heroes of our liberties.
No mere formulas, religious or political, can bind America — we
can, without spade, or mattock, or pick, lay her bare to her found-
ations—and, alive, or concealed in the coffins or charnel-houses, and
in the bones of the dead, faithfulness to the Constitution and laws,
which seal our liberties, may be found inscribed. The brave deeds
of our fathers speak to us — the thought of freedom is in their
blood.
PKEFACE. V
The power of sacrifice was the spirit which carried them to tri-
umph ; and all that concrete living spirit yet survives. No Gor-
dian knot, consecrated by absurdity did they fear to discuss ; no
problems of political sages escaped their logic. It was the heroism
of inspiration which led them to love our country ; and American
patriotism would survive were it engulfed in the bosom of despot-
ism — the soul of America and Americans is an instinct which can
never perish.
For the first time I appear before the public. As a woman, I
shrink with timidity and distrust. I have no afi&liations with any
principles which place her in a sphere at variance with that refined
delicacy to which she is assigned by Nature. I have no aspirations
to extend her influence or position. And from the Press, the accom-
plished and enlightened Editorial Corps of the country, who are
assured I have no political, religious, or personal animosities to
resent, I bespeak kindness, generosity, courtesy, and forbearance.
In my friends, who are distinguished by associations with all par-
ties, and sects, and creeds, I have all confidence that, however
much they may differ, they will neither resent nor grow cold.
Connected as I am with those holding the Roman Catholic as well
as Protestant faith, who came to this laud to enjoy fortune and not to
seek it ; alike imbued with the spirit and instinct of Liberty, which
led them to take refuge under our Institutions, which they assisted
to perpetuate — it would not be consonant with reason or taste to
arraign them ! — and though myself a Protestant, communing, iii
the faith of Protestants, with our common Redeemer, I honor that
paternal ancestry, of which I in common descended, with the amiar
ble, distinguished, and worthy Archbishop who bore my name, the
first in the United States, and one of the heroic signers of our Inde-
pendence, of which abundant proof is at hand. Yet it is not with
my family relations, Protestant or Catholic, with which the public
feel interest or concern ; but only in the merits or importance of
the subjects discussed. And when I reflect upon America's great
end and errand, and see the necessity of passing through the domain
VI PREFACE.
of equilibration, to avail ourselves of the thought which must pene-
trate and burn, if we wish to perpetuate our freedom, I feel that the
truth and earnestness which have brought out the American party,
will make it pardonable in all eyes to plead for the Protestant
Institutions, which shall foster, sustain, and cherish the principles
of liberty and the free government of the United States of America
as an incomparable blessing, to whose allegiance, in spirit and in
truth, the Ajnerican only feels and acknowledges responsibility.
INTRODUCTION
TO THE AMERICAN PUBLIC :
By a Friend of the Authoress,
Byron, on the eve of tlie war of Greece, says : " It is time to
act ; and wliat signifies self, if a single spark of that genius which
would be worthy of the past can be bequeathed unquenchably to
the future ? It is not one man, nor a million, but the spirit of
liberty which must be spread."
^ It is this spirit which breasted the Straits of Thermopylae ; it is
this which nerved the arm of Tell, when, with his unerring bow, he
shot off the apple, and reserved the remaining arrow for Geisler, the
tyrant of his country ; it is this which gathered the little band in
the Mayflower, and planted them on the eternal rock of Plymouth ;
it is this which moved, like the waves of the sea, the breasts of the
colonists, and unsheathed the sword of Washington ; it is this
which planted the " Eagle" over the " Cross of St. George," and
made the " Lion and the Unicorn" crouch beneath the " Stars and
Stripes ;" it is the same spirit that now animates their Protestant
descendants, and which says to the encroachments of the Papacy,
" Pass not the Rubicon which guards the portals of Freedom from
the tread of Despotism. We know you — well painted in the
VIU INTRODUCTION. ,
Apocalypse — you have the face of a man, but the hoofs and horns
of a ' dragon.' " And yet this " dragon" is here ; his presence is
felt ; his breath is diffusing its poison ; his touch has wounded, and
akeady partially withered our schools, the ballot-box, and the
Bible. Why is this ? Is Freedom less dear than when it first
lifted its banner in 1776? But the spirit of party reigns — the
power of the Papal priesthood is invoked, and the votes of the nu^
merous subjects of the Pope are demanded for aspirants for office.
Is it not an anomaly — is it not one of the most singular facts in
this Protestant free country, that there can be found an individual
who professes to be a Protestant, whatever the party bias or edu-
cation may be, that c-an barter the true principles of American
Liberty for priestly influence or Papal despotism ? To prevent so
baneful an evil, we must have an independent and patriotic Press,
and books of the right American stamp. And we rejoice to find
that the true Protestant spirit is neither apathetic nor dead. To
foster and invigorate this spirit, this book has been prepared ; and
how ought all who are born in this Protestant land of liberty, and
who enjoy, untrammeled by Papal tyranny and priestcraft, the light
of science and of Bible truth, to welcome every publication calcu-
lated to spread information, dissipate the clouds of mental and
moral darkness, and restore the poor, blinded Papists, in bondage
to priestcraft, to their native, orignal right of freedom of con-
science — freedom of Bible Republican independence. Thousands,
in every section of our vast territory, and many of our statesmen
and active politicians, are still in the dark on the subject of Popery.
Ibant obscuri sub node.
The subject of this book is no fiction. It is no evanescent tribute
IXTRODUCTIO^\ IX
to a prurient taste, developing the ingenious plot of a silly
love-tale, decorating some imaginary bero in false colors, and by
the charm of its drapery, and splendor of its style, throwing a bril-
liant halo around fashionable vice, to please and recreate the loung-
ing moments of a Custom-house clerk, or to beguile from more in-
structive and innocent reading a boarding-school Miss. Many of
the authors, especially of the modern school, may say, in the
words of a celebrated v» riter,
" Our busy pens have lighted, fools
The way to dusty death."
This just accusation will not apply to this book. This work is
founded on fact, real, historical, and of transcendent importance to
every citizen of this country. The Authoress, Miss Anna Ella
Carroll, is a Protestant, of the family of the Carrolls of Maryland
being the daughter of ex-Governor Carroll, of Maryland, the history
of whose immediate ancestors, as well as his own, is conspicuous
in the annals of that State.
The Authoress has been induced, by the request of friends, in
view of the dangers which, at present and prospectively, surround
her beloved country, to write a series of chapters, conveying her
thoughts on various momentous subjects, addressed to America
and Americans, with the design to revive the memories of their
noble Revolutionary sires, to rekindle an emulation, to imitate their
virtues, to remind them of their heroic deeds, to cherish and main-
tain inviolate the charter of their liberties, to beware, in the lan-
guage of Washington's Farewell Address, of " foreign influence ;"
to resist the false pretensions, the artful intrigues, and bold aggres-
sions of the emissaries of Rome, and to transmit the magnificent
X INTRODUCTION^,
legacy left them by their fathers, nnimpaired, to future generations.
There is nothing in this book to give the slightest offence, for it
is free from sectarian motives, from political or party aims, from
any acerbity of feeling towards Roman Catholics ; it is the system
of Popery against which it warns, not individuals. It is the pro-
duction of a young lady of refined education, and of a high order of
intellect. It conveys the purest lessons of ethics and of wisdom, in
''thoughts that breathe, and words that burn;" abounding in
sprightly humor, thrilling reminiscences, luminous descriptions of
historical incidents and character, and the most vivid and touching
appeals to the heart and the understanding. Inheriting the love
of country, the social and noble virtues, the heroic chivalry of her
ancestry, the authoress illustrates these traits with a pen dipped in
" Castalian dews," glowing with the bright colors of the rainbow,
and in a style of surpassing beauty and intellectual power, exhibits
the principles of a sound and lofty patriotism, and the most sublime
expositions of the rights and duties of American citizens. Would
that there were a thousand such talented female pens, glowing with
emotions of love and devotion to their country, and throwing their
burning eloquence over the hearts of the fathers and mothers, the
sons and the daughters, to awaken the slumbering energies, and to
revive the exalted emotions of native, primitive patriotism.
The authoress has carefully avoided to touch upon the sectional
interests of North, or South, or East, or West. She surveys the
mighty Union of the States as being under one government, and
subject to the same destiny — beautifully embodied in the motto,
"E PLrrEtBXJS XTNUK."
She leaves the diversified interests of the States to the supeiTision
1*
INTRODUCTION. xi
and wise legislation of disinterested and magnanimous statesmen ;
while, with a heart of the gentlest kindness, but earnest and impres-
sive arguments, she advocates the cause of her whole country. In
the language of Miss Hannah Moore,
" Our country is a whole,
Of which we all are parts; nor should a citizen
Eegard his interests as distinct from hers ;
No hopes or fears should touch his patriot soul
But what affects her honor or her shame."
This book is well-timed for the important crisis of our country,
and it enters on a precious and great mission. It is addressed to
all classes of readers, without distinction of name, or creed, or
nativity. To all lovers of their country it will be a welcome com-
panion and a timely mentor, and especially will it be appreciated
by Americans. Little minds, of unworthy and sinister aims, and a
Jusuitical press, may express opposition ; and so the peerless cha-
racter of Washington, and the spotless fame of Hancock, were
assailed, but which their own shining virtues repelled at an immeas-
urable distance, and their virtues only appeared more conspicuous
by such attempts ; so this book, by its own intrinsic excellence and
faultless beauties, will carry the seal of its own worth and sterling
and unquestioned patriotism along with it wherever it is read.
We feel a pride that our Authoress has added one more literary
gem to works of merit ; that, amid the busy cares, the varied and
noisy vicissitudes, and, too often, discordant tumults of public opin-
ion, a star of no ordinary brightness has arisen m our firmament, to
shed the rays of genius over our civic landscape ; to disperse the
clouds that cast their ominous shadows ; to inspire with new vigor
xii INTRODUCTION.
and life our countrymen, and to adorn the literary galaxy of lier
country. Let the young men who value their privileges, and as-
pire to an honorable rank among the wise and good, and as patriots
in society, read this book, and imbibe its spirit and maxims. Let
the women of America, and especially the daughters, who would
emulate all that is lovely and matronly in the noble virtues of the
Mothers of the Kevolution, occupy their leisure hours, with an
earnest interest, over these pages, and drink in their salutary
lessons.
"Education," said Burke, " is the cheap defence of nations." So
we commend this book, as one of those happy and sterling produc-
tions which will illustrate the same aphorism, and throw a safe-
guard around the edifice of our liberties, more precious and endm-ing
than the materials of stone and brass which constitute its tempo-
rary and pregnable fortifications.
HOEACE GALPEN.
New York, 1855.
e^^
t IP im a-vT I
CHAPTER I.
THE \VOMEN OF AMERICA.
' American Women, be faithful and brave,
Tour Liberty's perilled, your Bible's to save I
Then the Star-spangled Banner will continue to wave,
O'er the Land of the Free, and the Uome of the Brave.
When America was born in tlie depth, of the winter,
m the thick of snow-storm and drift, amidst poverty,
famine, danger, and oppression, woman hovered over
its destinies like a shadow, and gave freely her sacri-
fice, her sustenance, and her nourishment. And when
yet an infant in the world, who more than she should
come again to its succor ? Avhen pale and ill; it needs
her active sympathy and her encouraging smile. The
blood of America was poured out for woman, her
home, her altar, and her fireside ; it has given its soul
to her, and it cannot die but with her. And as the
soul disappears but once from its mortality, so woman
but once can save America. America in eternity, is
in eternity forever. God has given to woman to en-
lighten America, and to America to light the world.
When night closes on all beside, America sees, and
(13)
14 THE GREAT AMERICAN BATTLE.
wliile God and woman are witli her, she must be in-
vincible to the world.
Hence, when a fearful eclipse is threatening to hide
her from the face of the sky, who, more than Avoman,
should interpose between the shadow and the sun ?
And it is the high destiny of the American woman
now to lay her hands on this young world, and save
it from a crisis which portends her glory or her fall.
Who can say it is a low lot, to put honor on that
country for which our mothers thought it glory to live
and suffer, to toil or die ? And now, when Ameri-
ca's religion and political regeneration are staked, does
woman need a rougher instruction to bind her to the
cause which has so pre-eminently blessed her; does
she want labor, or toil, or hunger, terror, or doubt, to
make the path of duty plain ? " The Fate of the
child," said Napoleon, " is the work of his mother."
The Fate of America is the work of America's daugh-
ters. On their stern virtue, their cultivated intelli-
gence, their faithfulness to duty, to God, and their
country, depend America's salvation now.
Washing-ton did not hesitate to ascribe to these
qualities of his mother, all his greatness and his tri-
umphs, just as the Gracchi, Coriolanus, and Napoleon
did. It is the spirit of the vromen of '76 that
should now circulate and diffuse like a wave over
the nation. Who believes, had women then been be-
guiled into indifference, slothfulness, misapprehension,
or distrust, wavering in faith to her God and duty to
her country, the liberties of America would ever have
WOMEN OF AMERICA. 15
been achieved? "Who doubts the efficacy of that
energy and virtue, of those prayers and tears, of that
vehemence and pertinacity, which woman pressed into
the American cause ? With the blood of the first hero
Avhich watered Bunker Hill, sprang the desire for
independence in every woman's heart; and loving
ardently what she felt so holy, she threw into our
revolutionary struggle her feelings, her principles, her
imagination, and her substance. She enkindled the
flame which spread through all the Colonies, and carried
its light into the depths of the people ; and when
her unselfish love was seen, interposing for freedom, it
bound together tightly all former clashing interests —
it awoke the nation into life, and men saw and felt
liberty carved before their eyes, on the earth and in the
sky. Sparta, Greece, and Eome, furnish bright illus-
trations of woman's heroism and devotion to country,
but only in America has woman, enlightened by the
Gospel of Jesus Christ, bearing the standard of the
Word of God, been dignified with the true mission of
freedom, which is to bless the world.
Summon your resolution, said the women of Caro-
lina to their husbands, brothers, and sons ; yield not
to the fury of tyrants — hesitate not to prefer prisons
to infamy ; you are martyrs to a cause most grateful
to Heaven — most sacred to men. Thus, teaching
patriots to be more than patriots, they ground all diffi-
culties to dust, and, in an hour of deep despair, when
the obtuse nature of human perception hid our fortunes
in a cloud, when men saw only in lumps and masses,
16 THE GREAT AMERICAN BATTLE.
were blundering and quarrelling witli weak veliemence
and superlativeness, woman apj^eared, as tlie angel of
hope, to the American cause, and infused a thrill of
joy by her deep sacrifices and her rocky faith in the
God of battles. Thus a new impetus was felt in the
whole fibre of the Colonies ; their hearts swelled, their
veins thickened, as the thought of freedom rushed
into their blood. They communed with it in their
eyes and in their brain ; and ever after, vanquished
or victorious, that thought of securing it was ujDper-
most — " We were not born to die !" The same spirit
that the women of South Carolina displayed, blazed
over the nation. Women felt their mission freighted
with the weightiest convictions which encompassed
two w^orlds. Heaven and America were of God !
And whilst every selfish thought was surrendered,
they neither sighed nor Avept without meaning ; but
with accuracy, skill, and truth, they measured the
progress of the revolution, and gave their energ}^, their
sympathy, and service, when and where it Avas needed.
They followed their husbands, their fathers, and sons,
to the ships, the dungeon, or the battle-field ; they
sought out American prisoners — nourished, supported,
and encouraged them ; and when English tyranny was
exercised by banishment or confiscation, they surren-
dered home, and comfort, and luxury, and like true
women followed, amidst pestilence, famine, or death,
the fortunes of those with whom their virtuous affec-
tions AYcre enshrined. " Where thou goest, I will go;
where thou diest, I will die " is an instinct in woman
WOMEN OF AMEKICA. 17
as clear and shining as the stars. "Eebel" was an
epithet in which our revolutionary mothers gloried,
because it illustrated the birth, growth, and omni-
present nature of that independence which soared to
the skies. After the invasion of South Carolina, a
visible change was palpable : the patriot women
grasped and appropriated those reverses, until the real
took the place of the impossible thoughout the South-
ern Provinces.
AVhen Congress called on all the States to complete
their regiments, the patriot women of all th.e States
organized to carry forward the requirement. In a
town in Pennsylvania a regiment was furnished, armed,
and equipped, exclusively by women; they wrought
spirited inscriptions on their banners, and exhorting
the regiment never to dishonor their flag, dispatched
it for duty to the theatre of danger. There were no
pleasui^e-loving, ease-taking women of the Eevolution
to affect sympathy in verses, to vapor and play ; but
delighting only in what affected the interest of the
soldier, or the power and sacredness of the cause, all
associations were eschewed, all places of amusement or
pastmie discarded. The thought of the wounded, the
dyiQg, or the dead, engrossed their lives, their souls,
their hearts, their activity. They suspended their
jewels and their valuables to give bread to the soldier,
who was fighting to shield them — to make pillows or
graves for those who kad died for them.
In Philadelphia an organization was formed at this
junctui'e, and placing the wife of Washington at its
18 THE GKEAT AMERICAN BATTLE.
head, these patriotic women went from house to house
to incite liberality to the American cause. And thus,
emulated bj all the States, in activity and sacrifice, an
invaluable strength was added to the pecuniary power,
to facilitate and guard the machinery of war. From
elegance and opulence women joyously submitted to
penuT}^ and even beggary ; they wore the same gar-
ments summer and winter, often went barefooted, in
their self-denying spirit, to give nourishment to the