Christopher Newman Hall - Abolition & American Civil War

Abolition & American Civil War

During the 1860s, dissenting from the British government's position, Newman Hall passionately supported the north in the American Civil War. He disapproved of secession by southern states. England should side with the North, he wrote, particularly because emancipation of the slaves is just. He felt so strongly that he published one of his few non-theological books: The American War. A Lecture delivered in London, October 20, 1862. Newman Hall visited the United States during the Civil War, and published a passionate anti-slavery speech co-authored by Abraham Lincoln and Henry Ward Beecher.

At the Great Union and Emancipation Meeting at Exeter Hall, London, on 29 January 1863 in support of Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation, the crowning speech of the evening was given by Christopher Newman Hall. The meeting was a huge success, showing support for abolition in the United States of America, and reported by Harper's Weekly to have been one of the largest and most enthusiastic meetings ever held in London; its overspill of people who could not get into the packed meeting itself, was formed into three large, ancillary, open-air meetings. Subsequently Newman Hall made extensive tours in the United States. At Washington, he was invited to open Congress with prayer, and in the House of Representatives he delivered an address on international relations.

Read more about this topic:  Christopher Newman Hall

Famous quotes containing the words civil war, abolition, american, civil and/or war:

    One of the greatest difficulties in civil war is, that more art is required to know what should be concealed from our friends, than what ought to be done against our enemies.
    Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl Chesterfield (1694–1773)

    I am gradually drifting to the opinion that this Rebellion can only be crushed finally by either the execution of all the traitors or the abolition of slavery. Crushed, I mean, so as to remove all danger of its breaking out again in the future.
    Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)

    I know that I will always be expected to have extra insight into black texts—especially texts by black women. A working-class Jewish woman from Brooklyn could become an expert on Shakespeare or Baudelaire, my students seemed to believe, if she mastered the language, the texts, and the critical literature. But they would not grant that a middle-class white man could ever be a trusted authority on Toni Morrison.
    Claire Oberon Garcia, African American scholar and educator. Chronicle of Higher Education, p. B2 (July 27, 1994)

    He was one whose glory was an inner glory, one who placed culture above prosperity, fairness above profit, generosity above possessions, hospitality above comfort, courtesy above triumph, courage above safety, kindness above personal welfare, honor above success.
    Sarah Patton Boyle, U.S. civil rights activist and author. The Desegregated Heart, part 1, ch. 1 (1962)

    In a war everybody always knows all about Switzerland, in peace times it is just Switzerland but in war time it is the only country that everybody has confidence in, everybody.
    Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)