Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1889, volume 6).djvu/154

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TOMPKINS
TOMPKINS

were painted, and explained that these symbols were significant of the swiftness, strength, love for the Indian, and power to protect him, which were English characteristics. He visited England in 1734 in company with Oglethorpe, five other chiefs, and members of his family. As they were the first Indians in London since the appearance of the Iroquois chiefs with Peter Schuyler in 1710, they were objects of wonder and admiration, and were treated with great distinction. To-mo-chi-chi and his queen were robed in scarlet and gold, and were conveyed to an audience with King George in a coach drawn by six horses. He was received graciously, and assured of the friendship and protection of the English monarch. After a stay of four months, during which he received many costly presents, he was conveyed with his family in royal carriages to the ship on which he embarked for Savannah. His funeral ceremonies were very imposing. His body was accompanied to the tomb by a long train of Indians, magistrates, and inhabitants of Savannah amid discharges of musketry. A pyramid of stone was ordered to be erected over his grave in the centre of the city by Oglethorpe.


TOMPKINS, Daniel D., vice-president of the United States, b. in Fox Meadows (now Scarsdale), Westchester co., N. Y., 21 June, 1774 ; d. on Staten island, N. Y., 11 June, 1825. His father was Jona- than G. Tompkins, a farmer, who performed ser- vices useful to his country during the Revolution- ary conflict. The son was graduated at Columbia in 1795, studied law, was admitted to the bar in New York city in 1797, gained rapid success in his Erofession, and soon began to take part in politics, eing elected to the State constitutional conven- tion of 1801, and in the same year to the assembly. He was a leader of the Republican party in his state, and in 1804 was elected to the National house of representatives, but resigned on 2 July, before the meeting of congress, in order to take his seat on the bench of the supreme court of New York, having been nominated an associate justice on the promotion of James Kent to the chief justiceship. On 9 June, 1807, he resigned in order to become the candidate for governor of the Democratic wing of his party in opposition to Morgan Lewis. He was elected by a majority of 4,000 votes, and found himself in accord with the legislature in his sup- port of the foreign policy of the Jefferson admin- istration. He was continued in the office by the reunited Republican factions at the elections of 1809 and 1811. In 1812, in order to prevent the establishment of the Bank of North America in New York city as the successor to the defunct United States bank of Philadelphia, he resorted to the extraordinary power of proroguing the legisla- ture that the constitution then gave him. which no governor ever used except himself in this in- stance. The charter of the bank had been approved by the house, a part of the Republicans voting with the Federalists, and when the legislature reassern- bled it was at once passed. In the election of 1813 his majority was reduced from 10,000 to 4,000, and there was a hostile lower house in the next legisla- ture. Nevertheless, his bold act made him very popular with the common people, and his active- patriotism during the war with Great Britain in- creased their admiration. He placed the militia in the field, and did more than the Federal gov- ernment for the success of the operations on the Canadian border, pledging his personal and official credit when the New York banks refused to lend money on the security of the U. S. treasury notes- without his indorsement. He advanced the means^ to maintain the military school at West Point, to continue the recruiting service in Connecticut, and to pay the workmen that were employed in the manufactory of arms at Springfield. He bought the weapons of private citizens that were delivered at the arsenal in New York city, and in a short time 40,000 militia were mustered and equipped for the defence of New York, Plattsburg, Sackett's Harboivand Buffalo. When Gen. John Armstrong retired from the secretaryship of war after the sacking of Washington, President Madison invited Tompkins to enter the cabinet as secretary of state in the. place of James Monroe, who assumed charge of the war department; but he declined on the ground that he could be of more service to the country as governor of New York. He was re- elected in 1815, and in April, 1816, was nominated for the vice-presidency of the United States. His talents and public services were more conspicuous- than those of James Monroe, but the northern Democrats were not strong enough to command the first place on the ticket. Before resigning the governorship and entering on the office of vice- president, to which he was elected by 183 out of 217 votes, he sent a message to the legislature, dated 28 Jan., 1817, recommending that a day be fixed for the abolition of slavery within the bounds of the state, and the assembly, acting on his sugges- tion, decreed that all slaves should be free on and after 4 July, 1827. He was re-elected vice-presi- dent by 215 of the 228 votes that were cast in 1820, and in the same year was proposed by his friends as a candidate for gov- ernor ; but his pop- ularity had dimin- ished, and charges of dishonesty were made in connection with his large dis- bursements during the war with Great Britain. He was a delegate to the State constitution- al convention of 1821. The suspi- cion of embezzle- ment, which were due to a confusion in his accounts, un- balanced his mind

and brought on a

melancholy from which he sought escape in intoxicating drinks, thereby shortening his life. He was one of the founders of the New York historical society, one of the corporators of the city schools, and a regent of the State university. — Daniel's nephew, Daniel D., soldier, b. in New York in 1799; d. in Brooklyn, N. Y., 26 Feb., 1863, was graduated at the U. S. military academy in 1820, entered the ordnance corps, and on the reorganization of the array was made 2d lieutenant of