Synopses & Reviews
Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER II. 1820-1825. r 'HERE were many friends and admirers who -- sought the companionship and a share in the sunny society of Mrs. Childress's household. Among them was James Knox Polk, whose ancestors came to America from the north of Ireland, early in the eighteenth century. Their name was originally Pollock, but the wearing action of pronunciation reduced it in the course of time to Poll'k, and finally to the present name. Mr. Polk was born in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, November 2, 1795, and came to Tennessee with his father's family in early life. He was a practitioner of the law, and at that time principal clerk in the senatorial branch of the legislature, which met at Murfreesborough, then the capital of the State. In the public estimation he was a young man of mark, and very soon after was elected to the legislature to represent Maury County, the place of his residence, and was subsequently chosen by GovernorCarroll as one of his staff officers. He was then about twenty-seven years old; very youthful in appearance, but with a fine presence, though not commanding in stature. With quiet manners, he was still courteous and dignified. His own high self-respect and unswerving rectitude were shown in the respect he habitually paid to the rights and feelings of others. These sterling qualities attained their full development when in the succeeding years of power they had ample room to expand, and their strength and beneficence were so often apparent. The beauty and magnetic presence of the young girl, whose worth, dignity, and modest reserve, tempered by the graces of playful wit and ready repartee, formed so striking a counterpart or complement to his own character, made an indelible impression upon the young lawyer. His labors at the Court House where the...
Synopsis
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