Erika Lindemann
The 1850s were prosperous times for the antebellum
University. Enrollments continued to rise throughout the
decade, from 230 students in 1850 to 456 in 1858. From 1850 to 1860, 3,480
students matriculated, and 571 graduated.
1
The commencement of 1858 saw ninety-six students receive diplomas. For an
institution receiving no state funding but dependent instead on tuition
receipts and profits from the sale of escheated property, these healthy
enrollments supported the hiring of additional faculty and the construction of
new buildings. They also signified that, in the years just prior to the
Civil War,
public confidence in the
University had grown. By the end of the decade over
one-third of the student body came from states other than
North
Carolina.
Tennessee
furnished the largest number of out-of-state students, then
Louisiana,
Mississippi,
Alabama,
South
Carolina,
Texas, and
Georgia. This
increase in the number of out-of-state students can be attributed in part to
growing suspicion of northern institutions, but it also reflects the trust of
parents who had emigrated to the
Gulf Coast
states but who nevertheless wanted their sons to finish their educations in
North
Carolina.
Larger enrollments also stemmed from the increased prosperity of the
cotton-growing states, which gave parents the resources to send their sons to
college. The economic health of the times was signaled by
Chapel
Hill's receiving its town charter on January 29, 1851. By December 1854,
when the population of
Chapel
Hill numbered approximately 730 people (
Vickers 44), the
North
Carolina Railroad finished a line to
Durham's
Station, twelve miles north of campus, where a depot had been
established in 1850 on four acres of land donated by physician
Bartlett Snipes Durham (1822-58). Train travel to and from
other parts of the state had become easier, thanks to a decade of legislative
support for internal improvements, and the new railroad offered students a
convenient means of getting to
Chapel
Hill.
Students attending the
University in the 1850s were better equipped than
students in previous decades to undertake college work because preparatory
education in
North
Carolina had improved. This progress can be attributed primarily to the
work of
Calvin
H. Wiley
. Appointed in January 1853 as the state's first
superintendent of public instruction,
Wiley
was a politician of extraordinary energy and
commitment to public education. He codified the educational laws of the state,
tracked the ways in which common schools were funded, collected information
concerning the condition and operation of schools in each county, consulted
with teachers and school boards, and annually reported to the governor on the
progress of the public school system. He traveled the state extensively,
promoting the cause of public education, and wrote many pamphlets and books,
including
The North-Carolina Reader (1851), an
anthology of material about the state for use in teaching reading. Though the
school "year" lasted only about four months until after the
Civil War,
under
Wiley's
administration the number of schools in the state
increased from 2,500 to 3,082; the number of pupils rose from 95,000 to
118,852; and the number of licensed teachers grew from 800 to 2,752 (
Powell,
North Carolina through Four Centuries 307).
When graduates of some of these schools arrived in
Chapel
Hill, they encountered a curriculum that had changed little since the
1840s. Admission requirements still emphasized heavily a knowledge of Latin and
Greek.
2
Students still studied a set curriculum dominated by Latin, Greek, and
mathematics for the first two years and oriented toward the sciences in the
junior and senior years. Sophomores were still required to write compositions
every three weeks. Juniors had three recitations a week in logic during the
fall term and three in rhetoric during the spring. Seniors studied
Whately's logic and rhetoric twice a week. Religion
continued to be an important part of college life, students attending morning
and evening prayers during the week and, on Sundays, church services and an
afternoon recitation on the
Bible.
Some changes in the curriculum were taking place however. In 1845 the
University had established a
department of
law. Conducted by
Judge
William H. Battle
and
Samuel
F. Phillips
, neither of whom received a salary from the
University, the
law
department charged independent students, who had no other connection to the
University, a total of $150 and
University students $100. Students successfully
completing the two-year course earned a Bachelor of Laws degree.
In 1852 the
board of
trustees authorized a
School for
the Application of Science to the Arts, intended to train engineers,
artisans, chemists, farmers, and miners. The
School was divided into two departments and offered courses in civil
engineering and agricultural chemistry. Independent students could complete the
course of study in two and a half years and receive the Bachelor of Science
degree. Seniors enrolled in the
University could substitute civil engineering or
agricultural chemistry for law or ancient and modern languages and still
receive the BA degree.
By the end of the decade students also had opportunities to study
German, Spanish, and Italian, languages that had not been part of the regular
curriculum in previous years. Though the curriculum for most students remained
unchanged, the faculty seemed to recognize that students would not all become
clergymen, lawyers, and teachers. Increasingly, optional courses and what we
now call pre-professional training were seen as appropriate offerings for the
state's university. These elective courses eventually
would grow into the system of departments characterizing university education
after the
Civil
War.
Increased enrollments also justified a larger faculty, and the
number of professors in the 1850s grew from six to ten. Latin professor
John
De Berniere Hooper
had resigned in 1848 and was replaced by
Fordyce M. Hubbard
.
Hubbard
declined to add to his duties the teaching of
French, so in 1854
Henry
Herrisse
was appointed as instructor of French. In 1849
William
Mercer Green
was replaced by
John Thomas
Wheat
as professor of rhetoric and logic. That same year
Albert
Micajah Shipp
joined the faculty as professor of history and English
literature. He taught "English literature" only until 1851, when
students were required to replace the course with French. But
Shipp
continued to teach ancient and modern history until
his resignation in 1859. In 1854, when the
University launched its
School for
the Application of Science to the Arts,
Charles
Phillips
, who had served as a tutor of mathematics since 1844, became
professor of civil engineering, and
Benjamin Sherwood Hedrick
was hired to teach agricultural
chemistry.
Hedrick
lost his teaching position in October 1856 after
telling a group of students that he supported
John
Fremont
and the
New
Republican party, which opposed the extension of slavery.
Hedrick's
political views came to the attention of
William
Woods Holden
, editor of the
North Carolina
Standard
, a major
Democratic
newspaper, which branded
Hedrick
a
"Black
Republican" and pressed for his dismissal from the
University. When
Hedrick
refused to resign, the
executive committee of the board of trustees simply declared
his chair vacant. By January 1857 the
board had offered the professorship to
John
Kimberly
, who headed one of the first agricultural chemistry programs to
give students practical laboratory instruction.
Herrisse
left a few months after
Hedrick
, ostensibly over two relatively minor
disagreements with
Gov.
Swain
but perhaps because he also had sided with
Hedrick
. In January 1857 the board of trustees broadened
the responsibilities of
Herrisse's
professorship to include teaching modern
languages in addition to French and elected
Hildreth
H. Smith
to fill it.
The sudden death of
Elisha
Mitchell
, age sixty-four, in 1857 deprived the
University of one of its most respected faculty members.
Accustomed to spending part of the summers on geological field trips,
Mitchell
had traveled to
Black
Mountain in eastern
North
Carolina in June 1857 to verify his claim that it was the tallest peak
east of the
Rocky
Mountains. On June 27, 1857, he fell down a forty-foot precipice and
drowned in the pool below. His body was recovered on July 8th. First buried in
Asheville,
Mitchell
was reinterred on June 16, 1858, on top of
Black
Mountain, named
Mount
Mitchell in his honor in 1881. The
University purchased
Mitchell's
library
3 of
almost 1,900 books for $3,500 and named
William
James Martin
to the professorship of chemistry.
The number of tutors doubled during the 1850s, from two to four.
Selected from the ranks of recent honor graduates and paid $700 to
$800 a year,
4
they were assigned to teach mathematics and ancient languages to first- and
second-year students. In 1858
Solomon Pool
, the tutor with the greatest seniority,
complained to the
board of
trustees that tutors' low salaries offered no inducement to remain long
in the service of the
University. Instead of being promoted to professorships,
tutors usually saw those appointments going to faculty members from other
states. Speaking for all four tutors who signed the letter,
Pool
proposed that salaries begin at $700 per year,
with an increase of $100 per year for each subsequent year of service,
and that qualified tutors be promoted to faculty positions when they became
available. Though there is no evidence that the
board
acted favorably on
Pool's
proposals,
Pool
himself eventually received a promotion to adjunct
professor of mathematics in 1861, and after the
Civil War
became president of the
University during
Reconstruction.
Students of the 1850s were no less averse than students in previous
decades to harassing the faculty and destroying
University property from time to time. In August 1850
several intoxicated students attempted to stone two professors. In 1851
students painted embarrassing caricatures of the faculty on the sides of the
belfry and on recitation room doors. That year gunpowder also was exploded at
the door of the laboratory, and a noisy party of students blowing horns,
ringing bells, and singing created a late-night uproar. In 1856 the belfry
caught fire "during a sport of throwing fireballs, that is balls of strips
of cloth, tightly wrapped and saturated with alcohol or kerosene" (
Battle
1:653). In 1858 a group of students formed the
Lawless
Club, which, like the
Ugly Club and
Boring Club
of the 1840s, involved its members in heavy drinking and noisy sprees through
campus late at night. Students stole benches and blackboards from the
recitation rooms and piled them up for a huge bonfire. The faculty, now more
proficient at quashing such rebellions, expelled the leaders and successfully
sued them in superior court for damage to
University property.
Gov.
Swain
, sensitive to the adverse public opinion caused by the
disturbances, issued a circular to mitigate "exaggerated accounts of
occurrences" that had found their way into the newspapers. Improved public
relations and civil prosecution of students who violated the law significantly
reduced the amount of disruption students and faculty experienced by the end of
the decade.
The commencement of 1859 was especially significant because it was
attended by President
James Buchanan, a
Democrat
popular with
North
Carolinians. He arrived in
Chapel
Hill on Wednesday, June 1, accompanied by
Secretary of the Interior
Jacob
Thompson
, a graduate in 1831, and stayed with
Gov.
Swain
. After welcoming remarks, the faculty, graduating seniors, and
prominent guests enjoyed a midday dinner under the large oaks in
Swain's
front yard.
Buchanan attended the commencement ceremonies on Thursday,
meeting large numbers of people at an informal reception between the morning
and afternoon exercises. He was warmly received by some 2,500 visitors.
5
Gov.
Swain
understood completely the significance of President
Buchanan's visit. An old-line
Whig in politics
and a confirmed
Unionist,
Swain
doubtless extended the invitation because he wanted
to focus national attention on the
University. Under his leadership it had become one of
the largest educational institutions in the country. What better way to
highlight the beauty of its campus and the accomplishments of its graduates
than to present them during commencement? The 1859 Commencement also drew many
of the state's political leaders to
Chapel
Hill, including four ex-governors and incumbent governor
John W.
Ellis
, an ardent states'-rights man.
Swain
must have hoped that the
President's influence on
Ellis
might help him resist the political and economic pressures that were
threatening to pull
North
Carolina out of the
Union. Perhaps
most important,
Gov.
Swain
shared with
Buchanan a feeling of dread over the awesome consequences
of war. A man of good will,
Swain
doubtless hoped that the happy commencement scene of
June 1859 could be repeated for years to come, that the sections of the country
could be reconciled. Surely he must have nodded his agreement with the
sentiments expressed as President
Buchanan concluded his remarks:
I would advise these young men to devote themselves to the
preservation of the principles of the
Constitution, for without these blessings our liberties are
gone. Let this
Constitution be torn to atoms; let the members of this
Union separate;
let thirty Republics rise up against each other, and it would be the most fatal
day for the liberties of the human race that ever dawned upon any land. Let
this experiment fail, and every friend of liberty will deplore the sad event. I
belong to a generation now passing rapidly away. My lamp of life cannot
continue to burn much longer. I hope I may survive to the end of my
Presidential term. But so emphatically do I believe that mankind, as well as
the people of the
United
States, are interested in the preservation of this
Union, that I
hope I may be gathered to my fathers before I witness its dissolution. [
The North Carolina University Magazine 9
(September 1859): 108, NCC]