Union men showed signs of forcible resistance. When the ordinance of 1832 was passed, "the freemen of the mountain districts" were much exasperated, but the excitement then was said to be not nearly so intense or universal as now. Immediately after the legislature adjourned, meetings were held in rapid succession, each one seeming more determined in tone than the preceding. On January 4 the resolutions of a local Greenville meeting exhorted the officers to hold their commissions in defiance of the act, and the people swore not only to obey no officer who took the oath, but to stand by their "own true officers to death." In Darlington, Spartanburg, York, Anderson, Pickens, Laurens, Abbeville, Chester, Horry, Williamsburg, and other places in the interior, local and general district meetings were held to denounce the oath and pledge various degrees of resistance to it. The Mercury tried to make light of this "silly effort to get up an excitement," but it soon proved to be more than a "silly effort"; it was an outburst of public indignation which deserved and demanded consideration.[1]
- ↑ Mountaineer, January 11, 18, 25. February 1, 15, 22, March 1, 1834; Patriot, January 17, 23, February 6, 21, March 1, 11; Journal, January 18, February 1, March 8.
