Ghost Stories: The Temperance Crusade and a chat with a local legend continues

Ladies and gentlemen, as the snow gently falls on a cold, wintry morn, let’s return to the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and nineteen and continue our chat with legendary journalist and Highland County native son Hugh Fullerton.

Now, I should point out that this is 46 years after the Temperance Crusade in Hillsboro – and right at the beginning of Prohibition in the United States.

“Good morning again, Mr. Fullerton…”

“Come in, come in,” he says in a warm manner. “Did you do anything of enjoyment over the weekend?”

“Well, I watched the Super Bowl…”

“What’s that, Mr. Roush,” he interrupted, “some sort of bowling tournament?”

“Uh, well, not exactly, but that’s not important right now,” I answer a bit nervously. “Let’s talk a little more about the Temperance Crusade in our hometown. I thought it was rather interesting that when Mother Thompson learned that she was elected chairperson of the Temperance movement in Hillsboro, her husband, the judge, asked her, ‘What sort of tomfoolery is this?’ after he had awakened from a nap brought on – allegedly, of course – as a result of indulging in too many ‘long toddies.’ … Oh, and did you have a nice weekend, Mr. Fullerton?”

“After our talk last week, I decided I’d write an article on the movement and entitle it, ‘The Crusade,’” he replies with a smile.

“Actually, I’m off to a good start. As far as Judge Thompson, when I was a boy, it was current talk among men of the town that the judge drank hard, and the saloon men exaggerated this. The fact is that he was a leading member of the older ‘aristocracy’ of the town and the men all drank, chiefly after the stately manner of their class in the colonial days. In later years, probably more out of deference to his wife than to any moral or religious convictions, he supported her work and abstained from drink.”

“When we talked earlier, it appeared Mother Thompson was a bit surprised and perhaps even a bit nervous after receiving the news that she had been elected chairperson of the local crusade. Is that true?” I ask.

“At breakfast the next morning, one of her children asked their mother whether she was going to the church to attend the meeting,” Mr. Fullerton said. “She had not decided, and the judge, after pacing the rug for a few minutes said: ‘Children, you know how your mother decides such things. We will omit morning prayers this morning and let her pray alone and make her decision.’”

“Of course, we know she did, indeed, attend the meeting,” I say.

“Years later, she told me she dreaded the ordeal of going to the church and joining the movement,” he recalled, “but after praying for divine guidance, felt commanded to go. The women, without previous discussion, chose her as chairman of the meeting and she was too embarrassed to advance. She told me once, ‘I was so frightened and nervous I shook all over and could not arise from my chair.’ Seeing her embarrassment, Doctor McSurely suggested that the men leave the women to work alone. Immediately after the men withdrew, she went forward and called upon Mrs. (Sarah) McDowell to pray. Mrs. McDowell said, years later, that she never before had prayed in public, yet she seemed inspired. Then, without discussing a plan, Mrs. Thompson asked Mrs. (Romain Rathburn) Cowden, wife of the Methodist minister, to start the hymn, ‘Give to the Winds Thy Fears,’ and said: ‘As we
all sing this hymn, let us form in line, two by two, and proceed to our sacred mission, trusting in God alone.’

“I give these details as showing what inspiration was behind the movement,” Mr. Fullerton continued. “The women made no plans, formed no scheme of action, merely marched out into the winter day, singing and trusting.”

“OK, it’s Christmas Eve, the day the movement started,” I say. “As an accomplished journalist, could you provide a literary description of that fateful day in history?”

He pauses for a brief moment in time, leans back in his chair and begins to speak: “The day before Christmas, 1873, in Hillsboro, Ohio, was a cold, cheerless one. The clouds hung low, no sun shone, light flurries of snow fell occasionally. The fine old trees which lined the wide streets and filled the lawns of the old Colonial homes set far back from the roadway were bare. Dozens of horses were hitched to the rack in front of the stores facing the public square, but the streets were almost deserted. In the four drugstores, the bars of the four hotels and the 13 saloons of this old-fashioned village of three thousand souls, many men were gathered, drinking and preparing for the holidays, and farmers whose wagons were outside were drinking and filling their jugs.

“A long block eastward down Main Street stood an old brick church, tall and ugly, with a hideous square tower. It stood far back in the churchyard among the trees. On the wide brick pavement outside the front door, a group of serious-faced men stood silent, waiting. The sound of singing came from the church. The wide double doors were thrown open and from the church emerged more than 70 women, the leaders of the social, educational and religious life of the village. They were marching two by two. At the head was a little woman from whose eyes tears were streaming. Beside her marched a tall, severe-looking woman whose eyes were upraised. Some were pale but firm. Some were weeping, some trembled. They sang to an old tune of ‘Saint Thomas,’ a hymn called ‘Give to the Winds Thy Fears.’ As they emerged they sang these words:

‘Far, far above thy thought,
His counsel shall appear,
When fully He the work hath wrought,
That caused thy needless fear.’
“Those seventy women that day marched out to make America dry, and they have won at last.”

Let’s pause for now and we’ll continue next week.

Steve Roush is a vice president of an international media company and a columnist and contributing writer for The Highland County Press. He can be reached by email at roush_steve@msn.com.