The Gathering Storm

During the 1850s and 1860s, most Putnam, County men identified themselves with the Democrats. Democrats predominated in the rural townships while Greencastle became center of the new Republican party. A coalition of former Whigs and anti-slavery Democrats, Republicans feared allowing slavery to spread into western territories would deny opportunities to white emigrants.

Putnam County Democrats and Republicans debated in stump speeches and in local newspapers. Democrats favored enforcement of the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act, which required citizens to assist in capture of fugitive slaves. Republicans argued this curtailed personal freedom by forcing Hoosiers to become slave catchers. Political debates over slavery appeared regularly in the Putnam Republican Banner. The debate over allowing slavery in Kansas Territory in the late 1850s also concerned local residents.

Literary societies at Indiana Asbury University frequently discussed contemporary topics. Students in the Philological and the Platonean Societies, literary societies, debated issues of slavery and politics. With many students from the South, these debates were often heated. Chaplain and Indiana Asbury student Elijah Evans Edwards depicted the debates in his diary.

While slavery was not present in Indiana, many residents had family ties to southern slave owners in Kentucky. As chattel property, owners bought, sold and traded slaves using legal contracts. In this slave contract from 1854, William Grigsby of Putnamville acknowledged sale of his share of slaves he has inherited to O.S. Jackson of Ballard County, Kentucky. Another contract, written at an unknown location, illustrates how the fate of a seven-year old girl was transferred with a simple slip of paper. Although abolitionists were active in Indiana, the most famous of which was Quaker Levi Coffin, there is no evidence of underground railroad activity in Putnam County. Stories of homes providing temporary refuge to fugitives are just rumors. There is also no evidence that runaway slaves took refuge in Sellers' Cave, as local legends claim.

When Republicans nominated Abraham Lincoln as Republican Party candidate for President, the Putnam Republican Banner ran a full account of his nomination and described the excitement among local Republicans. Interest in the campaign was high, and more than 86% of eligible males in Putnam County voted. Lincoln carried Putnam County, along with the state, but the local outcome was very close. The ballot box used in Putnam County during the 1860 Presidential election and throughout the nineteenth-century is pictured below.

After Lincoln's election, there was much debate about the prospects for war with the South. Many Putnam County residents opposed war and some radicals in Indiana even called for the state to secede. Indiana Congressman Daniel Voorhees, an Indiana Asbury (DePauw) graduate, spoke in Greencastle and vowed not to fight against the South. When the Civil War began at Fort Sumter, The Putnam Republican Banner relayed the news and issued a call for troops. Back