Southern Historical Society Papers, Volume 27.
Reverend J. William Jones, Ed.

Address of Hon. T. S. Garnett

On the Presentation to the circuit Court of Essex county, Va. (Honorable T. R. B. Wright, presiding), of the portrait of the Honorable M. R. H. Garnett, at Tappahannock, Va., July 20, 1898.

His father was educated at Princeton College and devoted himself to the law, but died at too early an age to be remembered by any but his immediate family, by whom he was esteemed as a man of great intellectual force. [156]

His son, Muscoe, was born July 25, 1821, and was educated at the Elmwood School, established there by his grandfather. He entered the University of Virginia at the opening of the session of 1838-39, and graduated that session in Latin, Greek, French, German and Mathematics. After a year's intermission he returned to the University to pursue the study of law, and graduated as Bachelor of Law at the close of the session 1840-41. He was the companion at the University of John Randolph Tucker, William J. Robertson, William T. Joynes, John L. Marye, and others, who became prominent in the history of the State.

Being exceedingly fond of reading and study from an early age, he devoted himself to acquiring the riches of learning which he afterwards displayed in the wider fields of national life. His stories of learning were very remarkable and he was undoubtedly one of the best read men in history and literature that have ever adorned public life. His first political position was as a member of the Virginia constitutional convention of 1850, in which he took a prominent place, and participated largely in its debates. It was in this year that he wrote his pamphlet entitled: ‘The Union, Past and Future; how it works and how to save it—by a citizen of Virginia,’ which created such wide-spread interest throughout the South, and was deemed worthy of review in the old Southern Quarterly Review, published in Charleston, S. C. This pamphlet is remembered to the present day, although the issues which it discussed are long since dead, for it was only very recently that a gentleman inquired where he could obtain a copy of it.

Soon after 1850, Muscoe Garnett entered the Virginia Legislature, of which he was a member for several years, and on the death of Judge Bayley he was sent to the U. S. Congress from this district, and represented it until the war broke out. He was a member of the convention of 1861 which passed the ordinance of secession, and at the next election he was sent to the Confederate Congress, of which he continued a member until his death in January, 1864, although he had been defeated for re-election to the succeeding Congress.

Associated all his life with his uncle, Honorable R. M. T. Hunter, he had drawn his political principles from the same sources of inspiration; he was a great admirer of Mr. Calhoun, and was ardently devoted to the South and to the principle of State's rights. He was no mere politician, but his political faith was founded in philosophical principles, strengthened by deeep thought and reflection, and believed [157] in with all the ardor of his nature. He was naturally calm, gentle and reserved, but when roused by the inspiration of his subject he became filled with the orators' fire, and soared to the loftiest height of true eloquence. His well trained mind and rare learning enabled him to present with clearness and force any subject on which he spoke, even the intricate one of the tariff, which he frequently discussed in the House of Representatives. Believing thoroughly in the doctrine of the right of secession, he was one of the leaders of that party in the convention of 1861, and proved himself a strong advocate of the rights of the South.

It is not fulsome praise to say of him, that he was the most brilliant of all the younger generation of the sons of Essex, and when death claimed him in the prime of his manhood, the county lost its most prominent citizen, the State a gifted and devoted supporter, and the Confederacy an ardent champion. Peace to his honored ashes.