AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF JOHN F. LACEY 383 



At New Martinsville Rev. J. J. Dolliver, father of Con- 

 gressman J. P. Dolliver, was a frequent guest at our 

 house, for our home always gave good cheer to the Meth- 

 odist itinerant preacher. 



There was no church there and Dolliver gave his only 

 horse towards the construction of a new building. Father 

 did the brick work almost entirely for nothing, and though 

 I was only ten years old I did a good part at the carrying 

 of bricks. 



There was no public school system in Virginia in those 

 days and the people of the village employed teachers on 

 subscription. A pockmarked little bachelor Irishman, 

 Wm. Macdonnell, was my first teacher. He was a finished 

 scholar and he believed it was better to spoil the rod than 

 the child. He spoiled a good many rods on me for trivial 

 offenses but I loved the old man all the same. 



Robert McEldowey was head boy in the school and I 

 looked on him as a sure winner of the presidency in due 

 time. He rose to a captaincy in the Confederate army 

 and when the Civil War closed returned to the little old 

 town where he still remains. 2 



The institution of slavery only existed by tolerance 

 along the Ohio, for freedom was in sight on the hills of 

 Ohio across the water. I remember once when I was 

 playing on the banks of the river, suddenly a negro ap- 

 peared running at full speed with the sheriff behind him 

 and fifty men following close behind in full hue and cry. 

 The negro turned up the bank and ran for liberty as 

 though he was running for life. He gained on his pur- 

 suers rapidly and finally, dashing over the bank, he 

 jumped into a skiff and rowed across the river leaving the 

 sheriff and his followers far behind. I drew a long sigh 

 of relief as he disappeared in the pawpaw bushes on the 

 other shore. That was about the time of the invention of 



2 He died of cancer in 1900. 



