Frederick Douglass, the Orator - Monroe County Library System

Central Library of Rochester and Monroe County · Historic Monographs Collection
60 LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS.
met with the kindest reception from the Lloyds,
who were still living on the premises. He was
entertained in the old family mansion; was escorted
over the grounds, saw the buildings, many
of them standing just as he was accustomed to
see them in former times. He conversed with
many of the colored people who were children
when he was a boy, and whom he then knew;
looked into the kitchen where he had last seen
his mother, and his eyes grew dim with tears. He
visited the family burying-ground, and while there
Mr. Howard Lloyd kindly presented him a bouquet
of flowers, taken from the graves of those he
had known in his childhood days.
Mr. Douglass, on Decoration day, May 30,
1881, was invited to deliver his lecture on John
Brown at Storer College, an institution established
in the interest of the colored race at Harper's
Ferry, West Virginia. On the platform sat Andrew
J. Hunter, who was the prosecuting attorney
when the old hero was convicted. He applauded
parts of the lecturer's remarks heartily. Truly the
times had changed, and the sentiments and feelings
of that community had changed with them.
When Mr. Garfield, in 1881, became president,
Mr. Douglass was appointed recorder of deeds
of the District of Columbia, which position he
held till the appointment of Mr. James C. Matthews,
in the spring of 1886.