Frederick Douglass, the Orator - Monroe County Library System

Central Library of Rochester and Monroe County · Historic Monographs Collection
LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 51
It was proposed in Pennsylvania to raise ten
regiments, and Mr. Douglass was again requested
to give his assistance in the work of recruiting.
He entered this service with the understanding
that when they enlisted colored men should receive
the same treatment that was accorded to
white soldiers. The government, however, did
not do in this respect what was expected of it;
on which account Mr. Douglass, thoroughly disheartened,
suspended his labors for a time. But
finally, urged by Mr. Stearns, who had first sought
his assistance in enlisting men, he went to Washington
and presented the matter to the president
and secretary of war. He thus describes his first
meeting with President Lincoln: " I shall never
forget my first interview with this great man. I
was accompanied to the executive mansion and
introduced to President Lincoln by Senator
Pomeroy. The room in which he received visitors
was the one now used by the president's
secretaries. I entered it with a moderate estimate
of my own consequence, and yet there I was
to talk with, and even to advise, the head of a
great nation. Happily for me there was no vain
pomp and ceremony about him. I was never
more quickly or more completely put at ease in
the presence of a great man than in that of Abraham
Lincoln. He was seated, when I entered, in
a low arm-chair, with his feet extended on the