For those who have visited this blog before, you might know
that I am a proud alumnus of Hillsdale College, a small school in
Michigan with a rich history and tradition of a classic liberal arts education.
Hillsdale has a strong connection with the Civil War in its history, as well.
During the 1860s, the campus was host to prominent abolitionists and speakers
such as Frederick Douglass and Edward Everett. During the war itself, there
were many Hillsdale students who left Michigan behind to don the Federal blue
and fight to preserve the Union. Hillsdale’s connections to the Civil War go
beyond those who spoke on campus and the students who fought in it, however. As
it turns out, Hillsdale is connected to one of the five Civil War veterans who
went on to become president: James A. Garfield.
In his early days, James Garfield did not have a discernible
direction to his life. Born in a log cabin in the old Western Reserve of Northeast Ohio in 1831, Garfield did
not live in a world of privilege. His father died when he was two, and his
mother Eliza struggled to raise her young family. It may be said that
Garfield’s upbringing was among the most difficult of any president other than
Abraham Lincoln. Despite these difficult times, Garfield developed a love of
reading. The pages of a book could take him away from his meager home life and transport him into new worlds. Through books, he developed
the desire to become a sailor, a job which he believed would lead to a life of
adventure. At the age of sixteen, he left his home and went to Cleveland
looking for a job on one of the ships traveling the Great Lakes. Unsuccessful
in Cleveland, Garfield instead found a job on the canal boat Evening Star, where he worked for about
six weeks in the late summer and early fall of 1848. After falling into the
canal repeatedly and becoming ill, James returned home to his mother.
Upon coming home, Garfield was ill and unsure of what his
next step would be. Though he still wanted to return to his work on the canal,
his mother desperately wanted a better life for her son. She pleaded with James
to get an education, believing that schooling was the best path toward a better
life. Eliza’s efforts to convince James to go to school were aided by the
presence and influence of a young teacher at a nearby school in Geauga County.
Reverend Samuel D. Bates was just three years older than James, but he had been
one of the first students at the Geauga Seminary in Chester, Ohio. The school
had been founded by Free-Will Baptists in the early 1840s. The original charter
for the school from the Ohio Legislature was rejected by its founders because
it restricted the school from admitting any students of color, which was
contrary to the abolitionist principles of the Free-Will Baptists who founded
the school. The founders initially named the school the “Western Reserve
Seminary,” only to later rename it “Geauga Seminary” because of its location in
Geauga County. The school opened in 1842 in a church in Chester, Ohio, where students
met while other buildings were under construction.
According to Garfield biographer Allan Peskin, it was
Bates’s enthusiasm which impacted the young Garfield. While many school
teachers were cold and austere, Bates was warm and engaging. In Bates, Garfield
saw something of himself. Bates was also a native of the old Western Reserve,
and he had used education to pull himself up and make a life for himself. With
the influence of Bates and his mother, Garfield agreed to enroll in the school
and leave his life on the canal behind. To do this, his mother gave him
seventeen dollars, which would cover part of his tuition. For the rest of it,
Garfield would have to work hard, save, and live a spartan existence with
nothing but the bare necessities. Thus, early in 1849, James Garfield became a
student at the Geauga Seminary. There, his path to a better life began.[1]
James A. Garfield during his days at the Western Reserve Eclectic Institute
Over the next ten years, Garfield applied himself, studying
and working hard to make his way. In 1851, he became a student at the Western
Reserve Eclectic Institute (today Hiram College), a school founded by Disciples
of Christ, Garfield’s own Christian denomination. By 1853, Garfield had become
so proficient in his studies that he began to teach classes to his fellow
students. The following year, he left Ohio altogether and enrolled in Williams
College in Massachusetts, testing into the Junior Class. After graduating from
Williams in 1856, he came back to Hiram, where he resumed his teaching at the
Eclectic Institute. The following year, he became the president of the school.
On top of his duties in Hiram, Garfield became a well-known speaker and
preacher, traveling the circuit and delivering passionate sermons throughout
Northeast Ohio. In 1859, he was elected to the Ohio State Senate as a Republican
in the same week that John Brown led his raid on Harpers Ferry (Brown had lived for several years in Garfield’s Senate District).
General Garfield
Two years later, when the Civil War began, Garfield lobbied
Ohio Governor William Dennison for a position in the army, finally securing the
command of the 42nd Ohio Volunteer Infantry. By the end of the war,
he had risen to the rank of Major General and had been elected to the House of
Representatives. After seventeen years as a Republican in Congress, Garfield
was elected the 20th President of the United States in 1880. While his meteoric rise to the presidency had great promise, his time in office was not long. His
heroic life met a tragic end just months into his term, when he was shot by
Charles Guiteau on July 2, 1881, dying of his wounds several months later.
Today, James Garfield is largely forgotten as an obscure president, with many
only knowing him for his assassination and death despite his fascinating life.
Garfield's assassination in 1881
And yet, what connection does James Garfield have to
Hillsdale College?
Hillsdale College and the Geauga Seminary, where James
Garfield enrolled in 1849, were founded just two years apart. In 1844, Free-Will Baptists established the
Michigan Central College in Spring Arbor, Michigan. The school was founded with
the same principles in mind as the Geauga Seminary; it was to admit all
students regardless of race, gender, or religion, making it one of the first
schools in the United States, and the first in Michigan, to do so. By the
mid-1850s, the school moved south to Hillsdale, where it changed its name and
became known as Hillsdale College.
One of the key figures in Hillsdale’s founding and early
history was Ransom Dunn. A native of Vermont, Dunn became an influential figure
in the Free-Will Baptists as a preacher, theologian, and educator. He taught at
numerous educational institutions during his lifetime, including Hillsdale.
Dunn was instrumental in raising funds for the construction of a new campus in
Hillsdale, including Central Hall, which still stands in the center of
Hillsdale’s campus today. Without Dunn, the school likely would not have
survived through its early years, as well as the tumultuous times of the
American Civil War, when many other schools died out when their students left
for the Union army. Hillsdale sent a higher percentage of students to the army
than any other school in the state of Michigan, surviving the ordeal and
continuing to provide a strong liberal arts education while its students
defended the Union on the battlefields of the South. Four Hillsdale students
won the Medal of Honor during the war, and sixty died during the conflict. Dunn
helped the school to survive these trying years.
Dunn’s association with Hillsdale College was just one part
of his long and productive life in education. Indeed, he was involved with
schools in other states, including several in Ohio, one of which just so
happened to be the Geauga Seminary. Dunn was on a commission of Free-Will
Baptists that founded the Geauga Seminary, and he taught at the school as well.
Thus, Geauga Seminary and Hillsdale College shared the same principles in their
founding, as well as some of the same professors.
Ransom Dunn, a man critical to the success of Hillsdale College...
and future President James Garfield
Indeed, the two schools would end up sharing more than just
professors. According to A Consecrated
Life, an early biography of Ransom Dunn, the establishment of the school in
Hillsdale led to dramatic changes for the Geauga Seminary:
“When Hillsdale College was established it was thought best to centre the educational work there, and through the influence of Ransom Dunn and Samuel Philbrick, the funds and apparatus were turned over to the college, the building sold for a public school, and the useful work of the [Geauga Seminary] merged into the new and larger institution.”[2]
An essay by John Patterson in the Pioneer History of the State of Michigan explores the combining of
the two schools further:
On motion of Ransom Dunn, a committee was appointed to negotiate with the authorities of Geauga Seminary, with a view to consolidating the two schools. This seminary had been established by the Free-Will Baptist denomination in 1843 at [Chester] Geauga County, Ohio, and had been the result, to a very large extent, of the labors of Elder David Marks, who had acted as its financial agent. The trustees of this institution had rejected the first charter granted to it by the Legislature of Ohio, for the reason it excluded colored students from the privileges of the school. It was here that James A. Garfield commenced his studies. He was persuaded to enter this seminary by Rev. Samuel D. Bates, one of the founders, and for many years a trustee of Hillsdale College. Here Garfield recited to Prof. Ransom Dunn and Rev. George E. Ball, then teachers in the seminary, now of Hillsdale College and here he determined to purse a course of study.Hon. Samuel B. Philbrick, H.D. Johnson, J.E. Snow, and Daniel Branch were among the founders and friends of this school. Daniel Branch, Mrs. Daniel Branch, John Beech, Miss Abigail Curtis, Rev. George E. Ball, D.D., Rev. Ransom Dunn, D.D., Rev. George T. Day, D.D., Prof. Spencer J. Fowler, A.M., and Rev. C.B. Mills, A.M., were among the teachers of the school. The last five persons named have been members of the faculty at Hillsdale.After a year of negotiations, Geauga Seminary was sold, its scholarships redeemed, and the remaining effects, amounting to two thousand dollars and upwards, were transferred to Hillsdale College. Elder David L. Rice and Hon. Samuel Philbrick, of Ohio, rendered great service in procuring this transfer. Geauga Seminary and Michigan Central College were thus consolidated, and became the principal organized factors of Hillsdale College.[3]
Hillsdale College in the 1850s
That’s right. Geauga Seminary, where future Union general
and 20th President of the United States James A. Garfield received
his first truly formal education, was not only founded with the same principles
as those of Hillsdale College and shared some of the same professors and
faculty; the school itself was incorporated into the Michigan Central School,
becoming a part of Hillsdale College in 1854. By this time, Garfield himself
had moved on to other schools. While Garfield had left, the Geauga Seminary’s
influence on him was not over. It was there at that school where Garfield met
young Lucretia Rudolph. Though it would take time before a strong relationship
would develop between the two, James and Lucretia married in 1858. Thus, not
only did Garfield attend school at the Geauga Seminary, but it is also where he
met the future First Lady Lucretia Rudolph.
Even more than its influence in introducing Garfield to his future wife, the Geauga Seminary helped to light the fire of education
within the young Garfield. Ransom Dunn was not only instrumental for Hillsdale
College in its early years, but he taught and helped to shape a young James
Garfield in his youth. Dunn was among several others who had an impact on the
future president, teaching him to pursue higher education and truth with a
strong work ethic. Garfield would go on to become one of our nation’s most erudite presidents. He was literate in several languages, well versed in
science and literature, and his oratory was informed and influence by his firm
grasp of the Classics. By the time he was in his mid-twenties, Garfield was
teaching classes at the Western Reserve Eclectic Institute, becoming the
school’s president in 1857 when he was only twenty-six
years old. Surely, his quick rise in academics is due in large part to the
schooling he received when he was young, something which was influenced
dramatically by Ransom Dunn.
And what of Reverend Samuel Bates, the young man who helped
to convince James Garfield to attend the Geauga Seminary? The Reverend Bates
went on to found and preach at several churches and teach at several schools.
Later on, he served as a Trustee at Hillsdale College for fifteen years. Throughout his life, Bates
maintained a close friendship with Garfield, who never forgot the influence
that the Reverend had on him. Without Bates, it is not clear
if Garfield would have enrolled at the Geauga Seminary, dramatically altering
his life story and his rise to prominence.
And yet, the connection between Garfield and Hillsdale
College goes further than this. Just as Garfield always remembered the
influence of the Geauga Seminary, so too did his professors there remember him.
When Garfield died of an assassin’s bullet in 1881, mourning spread across the
United States. Memorials were held in churches, schools, and public venues
throughout the nation. It was no different in Hillsdale, where the connection
between the school and Garfield was not lost on the mourners. A memorial
service was held at the college, and among those who spoke was none other than
Garfield’s former teacher, Ransom Dunn.
Dunn’s daughter, Helen Dunn Gates,
described the difficult days surrounding the president’s death in her biography
of her father, noting the strong connection between the late president and
Hillsdale College:
But with the waning days of summer [Garfield’s] life went out and a nation mourned. Hillsdale joined with others in memorial services, and none more appropriately; for, as Dr. Ball said, “if there had been no Geauga Seminary from which to send out a teacher, S.D. Bates, to teach in Garfield’s school district and urge James Garfield to go to school, if there had been no Geauga Seminary at Chester Hill, five miles from his home, to which he could go in his poverty and there find help and encouragement, there would have been no General Garfield, no President Garfield. He was one of the early fruits of Free Baptist sacrifice in the cause of Christian education.’ And Geauga Seminary was now a part of Hillsdale College, and so it was eminently fitting that Ransom Dunn, who helped to found both, should speak at the Garfield memorial service. The suggestion was made by citizens that the remaining one of the group of five buildings be erected and named ‘Garfield Hall.’ But it is still waiting for some good friend of Garfield or of the college to give the necessary sum to erect and equip it, which we trust may soon be done, for the college needs today as much as then more buildings, better equipment, and larger endowment.”[4]
But for the lack of a financial
backer, Hillsdale College may very well to this day have a “Garfield Hall” on
its campus, in honor of the martyred president whose life was forever changed
by the efforts of Ransom Dunn and other Free-Will Baptists.
Without the efforts of Samuel
Bates, Ransom Dunn, and others, James Garfield would never have become the man
he did. These men and others at the Geauga Seminary were key to Garfield’s rise
from the poverty of a log cabin to the battlefields of the Civil War, and from
there, to a life and career in national politics that eventually led him to
become the 20th President of the United States. And of course,
Bates, Dunn, and others, would also be so important to the founding, survival, and
success of Hillsdale College.
March 4, 1881. James Garfield is sworn in as the 20th President of the United States
I want to thank by good friend and college buddy Pat Maloney
for his help on this research. Having just published my book on Garfield, James Garfield and the Civil War: For Ohio
and the Union (Charleston, SC: The History Press, 2015), I was unaware of
this connection until Pat brought it to my attention. While I was familiar with
Hillsdale’s background and founding by the Free-Will Baptists, and with the
story of Ransom Dunn, I did not know about Dunn’s involvement with the Geauga
Seminary until recently. It was only after looking into a source that Pat
passed along that I realized the extent to which Hillsdale’s own Ransom Dunn
and Samuel Bates impacted the life of the young James Garfield. Having grown up
a short distance away from the James A. Garfield National Historic Site in
Mentor, Ohio, I have always felt a close connection with President Garfield,
which led me to write a book on his Civil War career and the impact the war had
on his life and rise to the presidency. Learning about his connections to
Hillsdale only augments my appreciation for and connection to Garfield and his
story.
Pat and I are both alumni of Hillsdale College, proud of its
continuing legacy of standing for what is right through the years. From its
initial charter prohibiting any discrimination based on race, gender, or
religion, to its contribution to the Union cause during the Civil War, to its
continued pursuit of a strong liberal arts education rooted in the Judeo-Christian
tradition today, Hillsdale has been a stalwart example of the best of American
education for over 170 years. Its connection to James A. Garfield is yet another noteworthy part of that tradition.
[1]
Allan Peskin, Garfield: A Life (Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 1978), 13.
[2]
Helen Dunn Gates, A Consecrated Life: A Sketch of the Life and Labors of Rev.
Ransom Dunn, D.D., 1818-1900 (Boston: Morning Star Publishing, 1901), 65-67
[3]
John C. Patterson, “History of Hillsdale College” in Pioneer Collections: Reports of the Pioneer Society of the State of
Michigan, together with Reports of County, Town, and District Pioneer Societies,
Vol. 6 (Lansing, MI: W.S. George and Co., State Printers and Binders, 1884),
151.
[4]
Gates, A Consecrated Life, 199-200.
