Lovejoy, Elijah P.
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AMH209
N 38° 53.410 W 090° 09.952
15S E 745812 N 4308407
This is a monument to Elijah P. Lovejoy. He was oppesed to slavery and died for his beliefs.
Waymark Code: WM1HQ
Location: Illinois, United States
Date Posted: 09/17/2005
Views: 87
Information from Wikioedia:
Rev. Elijah Parish Lovejoy (November 9, 1802 - November 7, 1837) was an American abolitionist and journalist. Born in Albion, Maine, he graduated from Colby College in 1826. He studied at the Princeton Theological Seminary and in 1834 was ordained a minister, like his father before him.
Lovejoy then joined the staff of the St. Louis Observer. Afterwards, due to increased hostilites between State's rights partisans (who were incensed over the issue of slavery) and aboloitionists, Lovejoy left Missouri, crossing the Missouri River-Mississippi River, and became the editor of the abolitionist paper the Alton Observer of Alton, Illinois.
Lovejoys printing press had been seized by states-rights/pro-slavery factions and thrown into the Missouri-Mississippi River on three different occasions. He received another printing press from the Ohio Anti-Slavery Society (or possibly the Anti-Slavery Society of Illinois--records conflict). When local pro-slavery partisans heard about the arrival of the new printing press, they decided to destroy it.
On November 7, 1837, pro-slavery partisans congregated and approached Gilman's warehouse, where the printing press had been hidden. According to the Alton Observer, shots were then fired by the pro-slavery advocates, and musket balls whizzed through the windows of the warehouse, narrowly missing the defenders inside. Lovejoy and his men, returned fire. Several people in the crowd were hit, and one was killed.
"Burn them out!", someone shouted. Leaders of the mob called for a ladder, which was put up on the side of the warehouse. A boy with a torch was sent up to set fire to the wooden roof. Lovejoy and one of his supporters, Royal Weller, volunteered to stop the boy. The two men crept out-side, hiding in the shadows of the building. Surprising the pro-slavery partisans, Lovejoy and Weller rushed to the ladder, pushed it over and quickly retreated inside.
Once again a ladder was put in place. As Lovejoy and Weller made another attempt to overturn the ladder, they were spotted. Lovejoy was shot five times, and Weller was also wounded. Suffering the same fate of its predecessors, the new printing press was destroyed -- it was carried to a window and thrown out onto the river bank. The printing-press was then broken into pieces that were scattered in the river.
Afterwards, Lovejoy was considered a martyr by the abolition movement, and in his name, his brother, Owen Lovejoy became the leader of the Illinois abolitionists. Elijah Lovejoy is buried in Alton Cemetery in Madison County, Illinois.
The Lovejoy Library at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville is named in his honor. A proposal when the school was initially formed was to name the whole university after him.
(South Front)
(Medallion of Lovejoy)
ELIJAH P. LOVEJOY
EDITOR ALTON OBSERVER
Albion, Maine. November 8, 1802
Alton, Illinois, November 7, 1837
A MARTYR TO LIBERTY
"I have sworn eternal opposition to slavery, and by the blessing of God, I will never go back."
(North Front)
CHAMPION OF FREE SPEECH
(Cut of Lovejoy Press)
"But, gentlemen, as long as I am an American citizen, and as long as American blood runs in these veins, I shall hold myself at liberty to speak, to write, to publish whatever I please on any subject-being amenable to the laws of my country for the same."
(East Panel)
MINISTER OF THE GOSPEL
MODERATOR OF
ALTON PRESBYTERY
"If the laws of my country fail to protect me I appeal to God, and with him I cheerfully rest my cause. I can die at m y post but I cannot desert it."
(West Panel)
SLAVE VICTORIES!
This monument commemorates the valor, devotion, and sacrifices of the noble Defenders of the Press, who, in this city, on November 7, 1837, made the first armed resistance to the aggressions of the slave power in America.
In addition to these epitaphs in bronze the following explanatory insciptions are placed on the granite bases below the urns:
Erected
by the State of Illinois
and citizens of Alton.
1896-'97
Dedicated
In gratitude of God,
and in the love of
Civil Right Type: Not listed
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