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Alfred W. Arrington
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Alfred W. Arrington was my great great grandfather. He was the father of Mary Eugenia Arrington who was the mother of John Alfred Arrington Turrentine, who was my father's father. Got all that straight? Anyway he was an unusual person and you will be hearing more about him from me as time goes on. He wrote several books including one called simply "Poems by Alfred W. Arrington" which was actually published after his death. I have a copy of that book. I don't care too much for his poetry but after all he was an ancestor so I will be sending you some of that from time to time also. The preface of that book gives a bit of a sketch of his life and that is what I am transmitting at this time. it follows:
Alfred W Arrington Memoir
Alfred W. Arrington was born in Iredell County, North Carolina, September 17th, 1810. His father also a North Carolinian, was a Methodist minister of fervent piety and much eloquence. His grandfather, born upon the same soil, was distinguished in that religion for his scholarship as well as for his patriotism; he served in the war of 1812. The great grandfather of Judge Arrington, and the head of the family in America, was an English soldier who held a commission as Major in the British army. He came to America with troops, during our Revolution, to fight for King George, and did not return again to England, but purchased a large estate in North Carolina upon which he afterwards resided.
His mother was a native of the same state but of Highland Scotch origin. The family name was Moore. They were Covenanters; and doubtless left Scotland the victims of religious persecution. Like most Highlanders, the family was originally Catholic; for an ancestor was beheaded for his ancient faith under one of Cromwell’s military governors.
The mixture of the Saxon and the Celt in Judge Arrington’s progenitors, will account, physiologically, for his various and marked personal traits; as he possessed the double genius of both races.
His childhood was passed in Iredell County, amid the lovely and picturesque scenery of the Blue Ridge Mountains. The impression that it made upon his mind was never effaced. He had always a passionate yearning for mountain scenery, and often dwelt upon his delight, when as a child, to run away alone down the side of the mountain, and listen to the sighing of the wind among the pines. and feel his hair lifted up and blown about by it. The unseen force of nature filled his mind with awe, and was his first conception of an invisible power.
The Bible was his only reading up to his twelfth year; and his imagination thus kindled and cultivated at this perennial fount of poetry and inspiration. About this period a family moved into the neighborhood bringing a small library of books, which they placed at the eager boy’s disposal. He committed Lindley Murray to memory in about ten days; it was the first work on grammar that he had ever seen. A treatise on arithmetic was mastered in less than a month and all of its problems performed. The little library was soon exhausted.; for his joy was so great over the possession of a new book that he could hardly sleep with a new book in the house...
Soon after these events, his father moved to Arkansas, then almost a wilderness. His thirst for knowledge however continued unappeased; every spare dollar was invested in books. So the years passed away in mingled study and labor, filled with poetic dreams, for, like Pope he "lisped in verse". At the early age of eighteen years he commenced to preach; and at that time exhibited an oratoric power that resembled the inspiration of an Italian improvisation. He drew large audiences and excited great enthusiasm. He continued to preach for several years at intervals, until he lost his childhood faith; and after fruitless attempts to find peace in other communions, ultimately abandoned revealed religion. He afterwards sought in philosophy, a solution of his intellectual difficulties; but of course, with only partial success. He however never abandoned his search for truth. The different systems of metaphysics from the Indian philosophers down to the latest school of English positivism were as familiar to him as the alphabet. The principles of the physical sciences were fully mastered and their relations to each other and to human life. He sought in every quarter for the knowledge that would enable him to create a sound philosophy of life and morals.
He was admitted to the Bar, in Missouri, in 1835, and practised there, and in Arkansas and in Texas and for the next twelve years with brilliant success. He was at one time a member of the Arkansas legislature, but he was of too abstract a turn of mind to take much interest in politics.
In 1847 he visited the north and spent some time in Boston and New York, in order to enjoy the society of its literary men and gain access mto their large libraries. He wrote at this period "Sketches Of The South And Southwest" which had a large circulation through the papers of the day. They were exquisite gems of word painting, and in one of them occurs the celebrated "Apostrophe To Water". He also published an essay entitled "The Mathematical Harmonies of the Universe" which was greatly admired and which was later translated into French and German.
On his return to Texas in 1849 he was elected Judge of the Twelfth Judicial District, which office he held for five years when his health failing he was obliged to seek a more bracing climate. He returned to New York and while seeking to regain his physical powers occupied his leisure with literary pursuits. At this time he completed a work on Logic which had long occupied his thoughts and he wrote a novel entitled "Rangers and Regulators of the Tanaha". The former work was never published but the latter is still in print and is usually classed with Lieutenant Mayne Reid’s novels of adventure.
Finding that a prolonged stay in the north would be necessary for his health he resolved to find a home in the Northwest and resume the practice of law. He started for St. Paul but was diverted and settled in Chicago. He at once divined the future greatness of hius adopted home, and felt that he had a sphere suited to his legal talents. He gave himself up entirely to his profession and until within a few years of his death wrote nothing of any consequence except what was connected to his practice.
Though a master of prose composition, still poetry was his native element and his favorite mode of expression. It was only through his poems that he was able to express the burning thoughts that oppressed him for utterance. Poetry was not the business of his life but simply a necessary recreation after severe labors in another field. The poems contained in this volume were nearly all written after his fiftieth year. This will account for their grave philosophic character, for their ceaseless questioning of futurity; for their sadness and melancholy. A few of his later poems reveal a brighter and more hopeful spirit brought about by a gradual change in his philosophic views. The recent works of Harry Spencer had a most happy effect upon his mind. He studied them with the greatest delight and professed to find in them the poissible union of science and religion.
He died on the 31st day of December 1867 leaving three children—Flora, Genevieve, and Alfred. His son Adrian had preceded him to the eternal world. His remains were buried with the highest honors by the Chicago Bench and Bar who published an elegant memorial, commemorative of his legal fame....
For some time previous to his last illness his aggressive skepticism had entirely disappeared and in various ways he manifested not only a respect for Christianity, but a strong desire for the gift of faith. This solace was denied him until he lay upon his death bed when to use his own words "Like a flash of light every cloud disappeared, and the vision of Jesus Christ was vouchsafed me" He received baptism in the Catholic Church and was buried according to her rites, leaving his dying testimony to the divine origin of Christianity and its claims upon mankind.
Signed—Leora L. Arrington
Note:–I do not know at this time who Leora Arrington was or what her relationship to Alfred W Arrington was. The writing above serves as a preface to a book I have in my collection titled "Poems" by Alfred W. Arrington which were collected and published after his death. I also have in my collection a copy of the novel "Rangers and Regulators Of The Tanaha" by Alfred W. Arrington which is mentioned in the preface above. I will from time to time be sending you copies of the poems in Arrington’s book even though as a generality I don’t care for many of them—but he was an ancestor soooooo--------
I have one of his poems from that book copied into my computer file so I will send it along now. It follows:
AVE MARIA
All hail to the woman,
Who exalteth the human,
With her lustre to shine
In beauty supernal,
Till it meet the Eternal
In a union divine.
Oh, ye saints! Chant the story,
How she reigneth in glory,
A splendor serene:
With the Seraphim ‘round her,
For the Bridegroom hath crowned her,
Of angels the queen.
Christ hath wrought a tiara
Of twelve stars for Mary,
The glorified one;
‘Neath her feet, delitescent,
Gleams the moon’s silver crescent
She is clothed with the sun.
Hail! The sweet star Elysian,
Ever fixed to the vision
That faith hath made free;
The "Star of the Morning"
All the heavens adorning,
And "Star of the Sea"
Rainbow radiance encloses
This "Queen of the Roses"
In the meadows above;
This fair "Lily" enhances
The mystical trances
Of canonized love!
The hope of our planet,
All hail"the Pomegranate"
With its bright seeds of balm!
Let the universe heed her
Proud "Lebanon’s Cedar"
And victory’s Palm!
All the beautiful graces
That fond fancy traces
She calleth her own
Hail the Soul without error!
The marvelous mirror—
Divinity’s throne!
Hail the great gate of pardon!
The trellis closed garden
Where Jesse’s stem blowed,
When the Dove hovered o’er her
And the angels adored her
As the "Mother of God"
Oh "Well Full of Water"
Immaculate daughter,
Of the first fallen Eve;
Oh "Sealed Book of Learning"
Oh bush always burning
In thee I believe.
O Virgin, yet mother,
Whom the dragon doth smother
Under footfalls of light;
Pray thy son to deliver
My spirit forever
From the demons of night!
From passion and madness,
From doubt, sin and sadness
Implore Him to screen:
That my guilt all forgiven
I may hail thee in Heaven
Of Heaven the Queen!
Make me of thy cdhoir,
That tunes the harps of fire,
And sing as they soar;
"All hail to the woman
Who exalteth the human"
Into light evermore.
By Alfred W. Arrington
A poetry critic wrote about this poem that it was an attempt by Arrington to incorporate into the poem all of the symbolic references and titles with which artists have addressed the Virgin Mary in art. Arrington's poetry is pretty far out! More of his poetry later.
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