Dedicated to the Memory of Honorable Horace Davis of San Francisco as the only Tribute of Respect Now Possible to one whose Friendly Interest and Assistance the Author Here Gratefully Acknowledges Up to the time of Starr King's death it was generally believed that he, more than any other man, had prevented California and the whole Pacific Coast from falling into the gulf of disunion. It is certain that Abraham Lincoln held this opinion Edwin Percy Whipple...

This book is the result of the author's strong desire to know the truth relative to a critical period in the history of California, and a further strong desire to deal justly by the memory of a man recent historians have been pleased to pass by with slight acknowledgment. What was the nature and measure of Starr King's influence on the Pacific Coast during the Civil War? To be able to answer that question has cost more time and study than the reader could be brought to believe. It has necessitat

When Starr King entered the Golden Gate, April 28, 1860, he had passed by a few months his thirty-fifth birthday. A young man in the morning of his power he felt strangely old, for he wrote to a friend just a little later: "I have passed meridian. It is after twelve o'clock in the large day of my mortal life. I am no longer a young man. It is now afternoon with me, and the shadows turn toward the east." There was abundant reason for this premature feeling of age. Even at thirty-five King had bee

The federal census of 1860 gave California 379,984 inhabitants and San Francisco 56,802. Historian Bancroft informs us that here was "a gathering without a parallel in history." It may be said that the whole history and development of California is without parallel. The story reads not so much like the orderly growth of a civilized community as a series of unrelated and episodical events. There is little of logical order or sequence, and much of surprise, adventure, of conflict and crisis. Said

The period that determined California's attitude during the Civil War, coincides almost exactly with the first year and a half of Starr King's residence in the State. Less than a month after he had preached his first sermon in San Francisco, Abraham Lincoln received the presidential nomination at Chicago, and the great debate was on. It should be remembered that King's reputation as a lecturer had preceded him, and that he was hardly settled in his new home before he was flooded with invitations

"As a philanthropist, Starr King raised for the most beneficent of all charities the most munificent of all subscriptions." These words were spoken at the King Memorial Service held in the city of Boston, April 3, 1864. They call our attention to a unique service our Preacher-Patriot rendered the cause he loved. It seems almost beyond belief that the North rushed into the Civil War wholly unprepared to care for the Nation's Defenders, either in health or in sickness. Transportation facilities we

Above that of all other men the fame of the orator is transient. Eloquence may be "logic on fire" as Dr. Lyman Beecher defined it. Oratory may be, as Emerson said, "the noblest expression of purely personal energy." But it is so far personal, so allied to grace of gesture, to charm of manner, to melody of voice, to perfection of speech, to a commanding presence, that it carries to the future but a fraction of its power. The cold type and the insentiate page constitute at best only the record of