Revision 896979487 of "Marshall H. Twitchell" on enwiki

{{Infobox State Senator
|name= Marshall Harvey Twitchell
|image = 30312685_122548748746_Twitchell.jpg
|imagesize = 175px
|caption=  Marshall Harvey Twitchell; he has artificial arms in photo.
|office1= United States Consul to [[Kingston, Ontario]], [[Canada]]
|term_start1=1878
|term_end1=1905
|preceded1=James M. True
|succeeded1=Howard D. Van Sant
|office2=Member of the [[Louisiana State Senate]] from [[Bienville Parish, Louisiana|Bienville]], [[Red River Parish, Louisiana|Red River]] and [[De Soto Parish, Louisiana|De Soto]] Parishes
|term_start2=1870
|term_end2=1877
|preceded2=John R. Williams
|succeeded2=John W. Sandiford
|birth_date={{birth date|1840|2|29}}
|birth_place=[[Townshend, Vermont]], USA
|death_date={{death date and age|1905|8|21|1840|2|29}} 
|death_place=[[Kingston, Canada|Kingston]], [[Ontario]], Canada
|resting_place= Oakwood Cemetery, Townshend, Vermont
|spouse= Adele Coleman Twitchell (m. 1866-1873, her death)<br/>Henrietta Day Twitchell (m. 1876-1902, her death)
|children= 2
|party= [[Republican Party (United States)|Republican]]
|occupation= Teacher<br/>[[Plantations in the American South|Planter]]<br/>Government official<br/>[[Consul (representative)|U.S. Consul]]
|allegiance   = {{flag|United States of America|1863}}
* [[Union (American Civil War)|Union]]
|branch       = {{flag|United States Army}}
* [[Union Army]]
|serviceyears = 1861-1866
|rank         = [[File:Union army cpt rank insignia.jpg|35px]] [[Captain (United States O-3)|Captain]]
|unit         = [[4th Vermont Infantry]]<br/>109th [[United States Colored Troops|Colored]] Infantry<br/>[[Freedmen's Bureau]]
|commands     = Company H, 109th Colored Infantry
|battles      = [[Battle of the Wilderness]]<br/>[[Siege of Petersburg]]<br/>[[Battle of Appomattox Court House]]
}}

'''Marshall Harvey Twitchell''' (February 29, 1840&ndash;August 21, 1905) was a [[Union Army]] soldier from [[Vermont]] who became a  [[Republican Party (United States)|Republican]] [[Louisiana State Legislature|state senator]] representing [[Red River Parish, Louisiana|Red River Parish]] in northwestern [[Louisiana]] during the era of [[Reconstruction era in the United States|Reconstruction]] ([[carpetbagger]]).<ref>[[Jimmy G. Shoalmire]], ''Carpetbagger Extraordinary: Marshall Harvey Twitchell, 1840-1905," unpublished [[dissertation]], [[Mississippi State University]] at [[Starkville, Mississippi|Starkville]], [[Mississippi]], 1969</ref>

==Early years and military service==
Twitchell was born in [[Townshend, Vermont|Townshend]] in [[Windham County, Vermont|Windham County]] in southeastern Vermont, to Harvey Daniel Twitchell (died 1864) and the former Elizabeth Scott (died 1899). He was educated in common schools and Townshend's Leland Seminary. Young Twitchell taught school during the winters and worked on a farm and attended school during the remainder of the year. In 1861, at the outbreak of the [[American Civil War]], Twitchell enlisted with the [[4th Vermont Infantry]] and fought in fourteen battles. He was seriously wounded at the [[Battle of the Wilderness]], when he was in command of his company. In the winter of 1863–64, he was made a captain of Company H, 109th [[African American|Colored]] Infantry. In 1865, he was part of the column which broke through the lines of [[Confederate States of America|Confederate]] [[General]] [[Robert E. Lee]] at [[Petersburg, Virginia|Petersburg]], south of [[Richmond, Virginia|Richmond]], [[Virginia (U.S. state)|Virginia]]. He was also at [[Appomattox Court House National Historical Park|Appomattox Court House]] when Lee surrendered on April 9, 1865, to General [[U.S. Grant]].<ref name=history>{{cite web|url=http://vermontcivilwar.org/units/4/bios.php?input=31224|title=Jacob G. Ullery, compiler, ''Men of Vermont: An Illustrated Biographical History of Vermonters and Sons of Vermont, Part III," p. 160|publisher=[[Brattleboro, Vermont]]: Transcript Publishing Company, 1894, p. 160|accessdate=July 5, 2010}}</ref>

==Provost marshal, Freedman's Bureau==
In the fall of 1865, the 25-year-old Twitchell was named [[provost marshal]] and agent of the [[Freedmen's Bureau]], a Reconstruction agency aimed at assisting the [[freedmen]] in the transition from [[slavery]] to freedom. In 1866, he married the former Adele Coleman, daughter of a large [[cotton]] planter. From this union, he had one son, the [[physician]] Marshall Coleman Twitchell (1871–1949), who is interred at Lakeview Cemetery in [[Burlington, Vermont|Burlington]], Vermont, along with his half-brother, Emmus George Twitchell (1880–1961), also a doctor.<ref name="findagrave">{{cite web|url=http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gsr&GSfn=Marshall&GSmn=Coleman&GSln=Twitchell&GSby=&GSbyrel=in&GSdy=&GSdyrel=in&GScntry=4&GSst=49&GScnty=0&GSgrid=&GSob=n|title=Marshall Coleman Twitchell|publisher=findagrave.com|accessdate=July 5, 2010}}</ref>

Twitchell's initial headquarters were at the former community of Sparta in [[Bienville Parish, Louisiana|Bienville Parish]] south of [[Arcadia, Louisiana|Arcadia]]. In this isolated area, "[[political boss]]" Twitchell acted in the capacity of legislator, judge, jury, and [[sheriff]] though he had no previous experience in [[civil government]]. However, he was quickly elected to the 1868 Louisiana Constitutional Convention.

==Louisiana politician==
In 1869, he was elected to the first of two four-year terms in the state senate, having won critical [[African American]] support because of his having championed their causes and befriended individual freedmen.<ref>Louisiana State Senate records do not pre-date 1880, by which time Twitchell had been out of the chamber for four years.</ref>

In 1868, Twitchell purchased a [[cotton]] plantation on [[Lake Bistineau]] at the junction of Bienville, [[Bossier Parish, Louisiana|Bossier]], and [[Webster Parish, Louisiana|Webster]] parishes. In 1869, his father-in-law transferred to Twitchell the operation of two plantations. In 1870, Twitchell purchased the "Starlight" plantation on the Red River. He steadily added to his properties and owned two stores, two mills, a hotel, and a newspaper.

He was the principal force behind the creation of Red River Parish and the establishment of the [[parish seat]] of [[Coushatta, Louisiana|Coushatta]], located on the [[Red River of the South|Red River]]. He was also influential in the organization of then [[Racial segregation in the United States|segregated]] public schools in Bienville, Red River, and [[De Soto Parish, Louisiana|De Soto]] parishes, all within his senatorial district. He further stressed the education of blacks.<ref name=history/> Twitchell's life was constantly in danger, but he felt protected by a contingent of colored troops.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rn4p-eFL6oMC&pg=PA236 |title=Terry L. Jones, ''The Louisiana Journey''|publisher=[[Google Books]]|accessdate=July 5, 2010}}</ref>  In 1874, Twitchell's only brother, Homer J. Twitchell (1849–1874), and two brothers-in-law, Clark Holland and Monroe Willis, were murdered in the [[Coushatta massacre]], an attempt by Democrats in Red River Parish to seize control of the local government by killing or disenfranchising Republicans, including the parish's African-American residents.<ref name=history/>

On May 2, 1876, an assassin armed with a rifle attempted to kill Twitchell.  He was wounded six times, which required the amputation of both arms above the elbow.<ref name=history/> His brother-in-law, George A. King, was killed in the attack.  Twitchell would also have been killed, but when he pretended to be dead, the shooter stopped firing.

Had the shooter succeeded, the partisan balance in the State Senate would have placed [[Redeemers|Redeemer Democrats]] in the majority by a single vote. A Democratic senate would have recognized a Democratic [[Louisiana House of Representatives]], rejected Republican [[Governor of Louisiana|Governor]] [[Stephen B. Packard]] in favor of his Democratic opponent, and elected a Democratic U.S. senator.<ref name=history/>

Twitchell's property was abandoned after the attempted assassination. The remaining Twitchells stayed for a time in [[Indianapolis]], [[Indiana]], where Helen T. Willis, the third Twitchell sister, died before the family returned to Vermont. Reportedly, his neighbors had been jealous of his economic success. Adele died of [[tuberculosis]] in 1873, leaving behind her husband and toddler son. She is interred at Starlight, as are Homer Twitchell, George King, Clark Holland, and Monroe Willis, and two Twitchell sisters who died from [[yellow fever]]. Adele had refused to move to Vermont; so Twitchell had brought some of his northern relatives to Red River Parish.

In 1876, having returned to [[New England]], Twitchell married a childhood sweetheart, the former Henrietta Cushman Day of [[Hampden, Massachusetts|Hampden]], [[Massachusetts]], by whom he had his second son, Emmus,<ref name=history/> a veteran of [[World War I]].<ref name=findagrave/>

==Later years==
In April 1878, [[U.S. President]] [[Rutherford B. Hayes]] named former Senator Twitchell consul at [[Kingston, Canada|Kingston]] in [[Ontario]] province in [[Canada]], a position that he held for the remainder of his life, having been retained in the post during the two Democratic administrations of President [[Grover Cleveland]]. Twitchell died in Kingston at the age of sixty-five. He was a member of the [[Grand Army of the Republic]] and the [[Masonic lodge]].<ref name=history/> Late in life he prepared a draft of his memoirs, but died before he could finish the work. Edited by Ted Tunnell, the manuscript was published in 1989 as ''Carpetbagger from Vermont''.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://catalog.lib.auburn.edu/vufind/Record/798454|title=''Carpetbagger from Vermont: The Autobiography of Marshall Harvey Twitchell''|publisher=catalog.lib.auburn.edu|accessdate=July 5, 2010}}</ref> Tunnell followed the autobiographical project with ''Edge of the Sword: The Ordeal of Carpetbagger Marshall H. Twitchell''.<ref name=fgrave>{{cite web|url=http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GSln=Twitchell&GSfn=Marshall&GSmn=Harvey&GSby=1840&GSbyrel=in&GSdy=1905&GSdyrel=in&GSst=49&GScntry=4&GSob=n&GRid=30312685&|title=Bill McKern, "Marshall Harvey Twitchell"|publisher=findagrave.com|accessdate=July 5, 2010}}</ref><ref>Ted Tunnell, ''Edge of the Sword: The Ordeal of Carpetbagger Marshall H. Twitchell'' ([[Baton Rouge, Louisiana|Baton Rouge]]: [[Louisiana State University Press]], 2001. Pp. [xviii], 326. $34.95, {{ISBN|0-8071-2659-4}})</ref>

==Death and legacy==
Twitchell is interred at Oakwood Cemetery in [[Townshend, Vermont]], beside his parents and his second wife Henrietta, who died in Canada in 1902. There is also a marker at Oakwood commemorating Adele.<ref name=fgrave/>

[[Ruth Douglas Currie]] of [[Warren Wilson College]] in [[Swannanoa, North Carolina|Swannanoa]], [[North Carolina]], who reviewed Tunnell's ''Edge of the Sword'' writes:

"Twitchell did not possess the conscience of a [[Yankee]] schoolteacher or other carpetbagger whose primary mission was the freed-people. He loved matching wits with the southern whites he considered his inferiors, yet one can at least understand the resentment they must have felt with their neighbor's success. Twitchell may not have 'looted the public treasury,' but he understood the principle of 'honest graft'", having amassed wealth of $100,000 in land alone, 'by modern standards a millionaire' – and all by the age of forty-two."<ref>Ruth Douglas Currie, revied of Tunnell, ''Edge of the Sword'', quoted from pp. 257-258, 290</ref>

In recent years, Reconstruction historians have been drawn to the Twitchell story as depicted by Shoalmire and Tunnell. He is depicted as "an idealistic carpetbagger who braved ferocious reactionary violence in postbellum Louisiana. Honest, courageous, and committed, Twitchell was not the stereotypical northern opportunist of southern lore, and he has, as a result, surfaced in studies by [[Eric Foner]] . . . and other historians who have revised the old [[William Archibald Dunning|Dunning]]-school interpretation of the carpetbaggers."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.dropshadowz.net/v_30383037313330323330.php|title=Review from ''Journal of American History'', cited in Tunnell, ''Edge of the Sword''|publisher=dropshadowz.net|accessdate=July 5, 2010}}</ref>

{{Portal|American Civil War|Vermont|Louisiana|Canada}}

==References==

{{reflist}}

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Twitchell, Marshall H.}}
[[Category:1840 births]]
[[Category:1905 deaths]]
[[Category:American planters]]
[[Category:American schoolteachers]]
[[Category:Louisiana Republicans]]
[[Category:Louisiana state senators]]
[[Category:People from Windham County, Vermont]]
[[Category:People from Coushatta, Louisiana]]
[[Category:American city founders]]
[[Category:Union Army officers]]
[[Category:People of Vermont in the American Civil War]]
[[Category:People of the Reconstruction Era]]
[[Category:American diplomats]]
[[Category:American amputees]]
[[Category:Burials in Vermont]]
[[Category:Educators from Louisiana]]