HARRISON 



2702 



HARRISON 



Harrisons 



Grave, 

 North Bend.Q 



THE STORY OF THE 



ARRISON, WILLIAM HENRY (1773- 

 1841), an American soldier, administrator and 

 political leader, ninth President of the United 

 States and the first President to die in office. 

 He was the son of Benjamin Harrison, signer 

 of the Declaration of Independence, and grand- 

 father of another Benjamin, who became the 

 twenty-third President. William Henry Harri- 

 son was the nation's chief executive for exactly 

 one month; his death occurred on April 4, 

 1841, making his administration the shortest in 

 the history of the United States. He was in- 

 augurated on March 4, and immediately sent 

 to the Senate his nominations for Cabinet 

 officers, which were confirmed. His Cabinet 

 was an able one, including Daniel Webster as 

 Secretary of State, Thomas Ewing of Ohio as 

 Secretary of the Treasury, John Bell of Ten- 

 nessee as Secretary of War, and John J. Crit- 

 tenden of Kentucky as Attorney-General. On 

 the seventeenth of March the President issued 

 a call for a special session of Congress to con- 

 sider measures for improving business and 

 financial conditions. Ten days later he caught 

 a severe cold, which developed into pneumonia, 

 and at the end of the next week the nation 

 was shocked by the news of his death. His 

 body was interred in the Congressional Ceme- 

 tery at Washington, but a few years later was 

 removed to his old home, North Bend, Ohio, 

 where it was placed in a tomb overlooking the 

 Ohio River. 



Harrison's Presidency was the least impor- 

 tant period of his life. It is rather as a soldier 

 and administrator that history records his fame. 

 He was one of the few who won military dis- 

 tinction between the close of the Revolu- 

 tionary War and the end of the War of 1812. 

 In fact, with the exception of Andrew Jackson 

 and Winfield Scott, he was the only officer in 

 the American army during the War of 1812 

 to add to his reputation. He was a clever 

 negotiator with the Indians and was generally 

 regarded as their friend, yet when occasion 

 required he could fight them as well, as his 

 victory at Tippecanoe showed. He was for 



eleven years governor of Indiana Territory, 

 which then included about six times the area of 

 the present state, and on this whole region he 

 left the impress of his ability. It was this 

 pioneer section, simple and democratic, which 

 Harrison represented to the nation at large. 



Boyhood and Early Career. It must not be 

 supposed that Harrison was an uneducated 

 backwoodsman. He was born on February 9, 

 1773, at Berkeley, Va., where his father also 

 was born. The Virginia Harrisons were aristo- 



WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON 

 Son of Benjamin Harrison, member of the Con- 

 tinental Congress in 1776 and a signer of the 

 Declaration of Independence ; grandfather of Ben- 

 jamin Harrison, who became President in 1889. 



crats and among the best-known families in the 

 colonies. Public service was a tradition in 

 the Harrison family, as it was among the Lees 

 of Virginia and the Adams family of Massa- 

 chusetts. Young Harrison was given a sound 

 education, and was graduated from Hampden- 

 Sidney College in 1790. His father insisted 

 that he begin the study of medicine, but the 

 death of the elder Harrison in 1791 released 



