THURSDAY, JAN. 17, 1878.

————————————————

SHERRARD CLEMENS.

———

Formerly of Wheeling, now of St.

Louis—A Characteristic Com-

munication from His Pen.

St. Louis Times of Sunday.

to the memory of james clemens, jr.

The name of Clemens is Roman and of
historic interest. It comes from the Latin
adjective clemens, which means kind, am-
iable, merciful, pleasant, good hearted.
Clemens Romanus was, according to some
historians, the second, and according to
others, the third Pope of Rome. He was
so called to distinguish him from Clem-
ens of Alexandria, in Egypt, designated
as Clemens Alexandrinis. Both were
early fathers of the church, and the writ-
ings of the latter have been translated in-
to English. The name was distinguished
very early in the history of the church.
Flavius Clemens was a cousin to the
Emperor Domitian, and was put to death
as the first male martyr in Rome, and his
niece, Domatilla Clemens, was the first
female martyr. Julius Clemens was a
lieutenant under Cæsar in his invasion
of Great Britain.

But let these attested facts pass, and
let us go to others within the range of
modern verification. Gregory Clemens
was a land-holder in Huntingdonshire,
in England; a contemporary of Cromwell,
and as a member of the English Parlia-
ment, signed the death warrant of
Charles I. During the protectorate of
Cromwell he was appointed English Min-
ister to Spain and, during his term of
service, was married to a Spanish lady in
the city of Cordova. After the death of
Cromwell, and on the accession of Charles
II., Gregory Clemens was tried as a regi-
cide; his estates were confiscated to the
Crown, and he suffered the barbarous and
ignominious death which English laws
then provided for all such cases; and his
head was exposed on a pole on the top of
Westminster Hall. His widow with her
children emigrated with his two brothers
to Augusta county, Virginia, and they
purchased a farm near the town of Staun-
ton. Staunton was subsequently the
place of holding the Federal Court for
the Western District of Virginia, the
State claiming jurisdiction to the Yough-
egheney river in the present State of
Pennsylvania, including Fort Pitt, now
Pittsburgh. It was the Virginia troops
under Washington, and the British regu-
lars under Braddock, which met with
such disasters in defense of this jurisdic-
tion. James Clemens, the elder, the
grandfather of James Clemens, jr., was
the descendant of the regicide, Gregory
Clemens, and on the 13th day of June,
1785, had a survey made of land, on the
waters of Buffalo Creek, on a Virginia
certificate of 399 acres and six perches.
On the 2d day of June, 1786, letters patent
from the Commonwealth of Virginia is-
sued for this tract, and it is in possession
of the widow of one of his descendants to
this day. In running Mason and Dixon’s
line and fixing the boundary between
Virginia and Pennsylvania this tract was
divided, a part being in Donegal [town-]
ship, Washington county, [Pennsylvania,]
and the balance in Virginia.

James Clemens, the elder, died in De-
cember 1869. His will as probated was
dated September 21, 1795. His sons
were Jeremiah, William, Abraham, John,
James and Ezekiel. Jeremiah moved to
Danville, Ky., and was the father of the
subject of this sketch. James moved to
Huntsville, Alabama, and was the father
of Jeremiah Clemens, Senator from Ala-
bama, and the author of several literary
works of no mean ability. Ezekiel re-
moved to Tennessee, and was the proge-
nitor of Samuel L. Clemens, better known
under the nom de plume of Mark Twain.

James Clemens, jr., of St. Louis, Mo.,
was born in Danville, Ky., on the 29th
of October, 1791, and to distinguish him-
self from the elder of the same name in
Alabama, he attached junior to his [name.]
He enjoyed only the advantages of a com-
mon school education, such as could be had
at that early period in Kentucky; which
consisted of only four counties. [At a]
very early period, he became a clerk in
Mr. Bell’s store in Danville, and he there
received his mercantile [education. ]
Throughout his early life he was a [great]
reader; he may be said to have [instruct-]
ed himself; and the large and well [select-]
ed library at his [residence’] in this city
bears evidence, not only of his taste, but
his culture. In October 1811, being
then about 21 years of age, he removed
from Danville to Sparta, in Tennessee.

He remained at Sparta until April,
1815. He was engaged in the mercantile
business in connection with James Clem-
ens, the elder, of Huntsville, Ala., and
during the war of 1812 the firm accumu-
lated vast amounts of money in making
saltpetre and furnishing it to the Gov-
ernment for the manufacture of gunpow-
der. With the capital thus acquired the
younger came to St. Genevieve, in Mis-
souri, and established himself in business,
that spot being then the most commer-
cial place in the State. He came to St.
Louis, April, 1817, and opened a store on
the corner of Main and Market streets.
He dealt in dry goods, groceries, furs and
peltries, and by his careful, prudent [man-]
agement steadily added to his [capital.]
To keep up his stock, he was compelled
to make the journey on horseback
through the wilderness of Illinois, In-
diana and Ohio. His reminiscences of
these trips, and of the manners and cus-
toms of the early pioneers [of St. Louis]
and of the West, were full of strange [in-]
terest; but this is not the time recount
them.

In January, 1833, having then an [am-]
ple fortune, he married Miss [Eliza Mul-]
lanphy. She was the mother of seven
children, of whom six are living, one boy,
Richard, in whom they placed great hope,
dying in his youth. The survivors [are]
James B. Clemens, [Bryan M. Clemens,]
William J. Clemens, Mrs. C. J. Cates,
Mrs. Ellen I. Clemens and Mrs. Alice B.
Von Versen, the latter of whom resides
in Europe, the balance here. Mrs. Eliza
M. Clemens died at her country residence
August 20, 1853, and her husband became
tenant by the courtesy of the vast [landed]
property which she had inherited from
her father, John [Mullanphy,] The writer
of this well recollects her appearance in
the year 1846, when he was a delegate to
the Pacific Railroad Convention, which
was held in the rotunda of the Court-
house. She was of compact build, with a
large and well-developed head, especially
distinct in its perceptive faculties, with
dark complexion and features, expressive
of high intelligence and culture, and she
was the handsomest of John Mullanphy’s
daughters.

Her manners were especially gracious
and winning. She was domestic in her
tastes and a model wife and mother. If
the husband was the “bread winner” she
was the “bread saver” of the family, for
while they resided on the large farm, on
the Olive street road, she hoarded out of
the marketable products of the place
$2,000 in specie, which she one day pre-
sented to her astonished and delighted
partner. Something may be gleaned of
the impression she made by an incident
which transpired in the trial of Cutter
vs. Waddingham and others, in the Cir-
cuit Court in 1846, when the elder Krum
presided as Judge. The title affected the
Mullanphy heirs, and on the death of
Mrs. Clemens the record shows that Judge
Krum said:

“The death of Mrs. Clemens rendered
necessary that some legal representative
of hers should appear in the suit, and I
cannot allow the occasion to pass, [al-]
though out of the usual order, without
saying a word by way of tribute to her
memory. She was one my most valued
friends. She was always in full accord
with every movement that pertained to
the advancement of this city. In all hu-
manitarian or charitable works she was
always among the foremost; and she was
an ornament to society, whose loss can-
not be readily replaced.”

In 1846 Mr. Clemens retired from ac-
tive business and devoted the remainder
of his days to the care of the large real
estate which devolved upon him. To this
his constant and exclusive attention was
given. During his active business [life]
he was Alderman of this city; [director]
and one of the original [proprietors of the]
old Gas Company, and he was for [many]
years President of the Irish [Emigrant]
Society. He was one of the [original]
founders of the First Episcopal Church of
this city, but he died within the fold of
the holy Catholic Church.

Save these positions he refused all oth-
ers, and devoted himself, with untiring
assiduity, to the management of his es-
tate. He was to be found at all hours of
the day, and often far into the night, in
his office. As an accountant and book-
keeper he had no superior, and he often
boasted that the books of the Gas Compa-
ny were now kept on the same system
which he inaugurated as a director. He
was solitary in his habits and tastes, and
when driven to it, had more self-sustain-
ing power than any man we have ever
known.

He had many peculiarities, eccentrici-
ties and idiosyncrasies. His true inward-
ness was little understood by the outside
world. The truth is, he was in it, but
not of it. No one had, when truthfully
touched, a more open, generous, kinder,
or a more magnanimous heart. His ben-
efactions were a thousand-fold, while he
was as hard as a rock in what he thought
his rights, while he would chaffer on the
divide of a hair in a settlement, yet that
same rock when rightly struck became
soft as water, as his charities silently and
unostentatiously flowed into poor, needy
or worthy hands. Among his largest
public contributions may be mentioned
that to celebrate the opening of the bridge
and that for the relief of the sufferers by
the Chicago fire. No appeal was ever
made to him in behalf of any pubic
movement in this city where his means
were withheld. And yet, to many, he
appeared hard, calculating, avaricious,
and imperiously cold. Yes, it may have
seemed so, but it was only the harsh, for-
bidding outside of an oriental nut covered
with roughness and nettles, but when
opened full of rich, ripe, red, luscious
fruit. His temper was impulsive, im-
perious and volcanic. It was the motive
power which gave energy, life and grit to
the man. He could be [pursuaded] in the
right, by the pull of a single hair, or the
magic of a gentle, soothing word; he could
not be forced, or coerced, by any possible
power. And yet, in the inner nature of
this apparently impassive, calculating,
undemonstrative person, there was, to use
the fine image of Emerson, “a pool of
honey about his heart, which lubricated
its action, in fine jets of sparkling mead.”

Verily,

“In men, whom men condemn as ill,

I find so much of goodness still;

In men, whom men pronounce divine,

I find so much of sin and blot,

I hesitate to draw the line

Where God has not!”

Mr. Clemens’ favorite part of the Bible
was Christ’s Sermon on the Mount. This
writer has often read to him, and it was
wonderful to see the unabated interest
which he took in it; and he never seemed
to tire in commenting on its divine philo-
sophy. He considered that Christ’s suf-
fering in the Garden of Gethsemane was
but a type of what unregenerate man is
predestined to undergo in this word. He
was his ideal hero; he too, like all the
earth, “was a man of sorrows, and ac-
quainted with grief.” Whatever his
troubles were, this thought gave him self-
sustaining power and final consolation.
Even pagan mythology could not dispense
with some such elevating power, for it
made [Antœrus] rise from the dust the
stronger from every fall. So the Chris-
tian hero in surveying the battle fields of
life is called upon to look only upon the
conquered passions at his feet. It is the
utter subjection of all the sinful and re-
fractory elements of his own nature that
elevates, consecrates and purifies him and
gives him the power to peer calmly
through the ebon gates of death to the
unknown and eternal hereafter beyond.

So having reached a period beyond that
allotted by the Psalmist: full of years;
full of honors; full of earthly possessions
and experiences, and full of precious
divine hope and consolation, his soul con-
fronted eternity. He stood at last upon
the very edge of life, and the infinite fu-
ture came before him. Who shall say
that his spirit did not see more than any
of us can now see?

And yet he trembled not; but with
calm heroism, like that which he evinced
from youth, took the last fatal step, and
with a blessing on those he left behind,
vanished forever.

Hail and farewell, spirit of my earlier,
my better and my happier days!

And in the language of St. Augustine
“May the children of the spirit, placed
each in their own firmament, make their
light shine upon the earth; and mayest
thou still crown the years with thy bless-
ings as thou sendest forth thy laborers
into thy harvest sown by other hands
than theirs, as they in turn send forth
new laborers to new seed times, whereof
the harvest shall be perennial.”

So, to those who loved thee, thy appro-
priate epitaph shall be:

“As ’mid the ever rolling sea,

The eternal isles established be,

And all the billows of the main

Fret, rage, and break themselves in vain;

As in the heavens the urns divine

Of golden light forever shine;

Tho’ streams may darken, tempests rage,

They still shine on from age to age.

So ’mid the ocean tide of years,

The image of the just appears,

So from its darkness and its gloom,

The good man’s virtues light his tomb.”

S. C.