702 



STEPHENS, ALEXANDER H. 



commissioned by the proprietor of the Herald 

 to find Dr. Livingstone. After attending the 

 opening of the Suez Canal, he visited Constan- 

 tinople, Palestine, the Crimea, the Valley of 

 the Euphrates, Persia, and India, and sailed 

 from Bombay, October 12, 1870. He arrived 

 at Zanzibar, January 6, 1871, and set out for 

 the interior of Africa on March 21st, with 192 

 followers. He found Dr. Livingstone at Ujiji, 

 Lake Tanganyika, November 10th, explored 

 with him the northern portion of the lake, and 

 began his return voyage on March 14, 1872. 

 He arrived in England late in July, and gave 

 an account of his expedition before the British 

 Association at Brighton, August 16th. On 

 August 27th the Queen sent him a gold snuff- 

 box set with diamonds, and on October 21st he 

 was banqueted by the Royal Geographical 

 Society. In November he published " How I 

 found Livingstone " (London and New York). 

 In 1873 he received the patron's medal of the 

 Royal Geographical Society. After the death 

 of lavingstone, Mr. Stanley was commissioned, 

 by the proprietors of the New York Herald and 

 the London Telegraph, to explore the lake 

 region of Equatorial Africa. As reported in 

 his letters to those journals, he left Zanzibar 

 in November, 1874, at the head of 350 men, 

 diverged from the usual road at Upwapwa, 

 reached the western frontier of Ugongo on 

 December 31st, struck direct across an almost 

 level plain, and at Tchiwyu, in the Urimi coun- 

 try, about the latitude of Ujiji, he found the 

 waters flowing northward. Thence he followed 

 the course of the river Shemeeyu for 350 

 miles, and reached Kagehyi, on the Victoria 

 N'yanza Lake, February 27, 1875, having lost 

 194 men by death and desertion. He launched 

 a boat, conveyed in pieces from the coast, and 

 circumnavigated the lake, assisted by 30 canoes 

 lent him by M'tesa, King of Uganda. His cir- 

 cumnavigation covered about 1,000 miles ; he 

 minutely explored the inlets, and found that 

 the opinion of Burton and Livingstone, based on 

 native reports, that N'yanza is a collection ot 

 lagoons, is wrong, and that Speke and Grant 

 were right in declaring it to be one large lake, 

 containing many islands. On April 17th he 

 started to complete his exploration of the west 

 side of the Victoria N'yanza. In November, 

 1876, Stanley reached Nyangwa, the farthest 

 northern point attained by Livingstone or Cam- 

 eron. He was on the Congo River for nine 

 months, and reached the Atlantic coast in 

 August, 1877. He returned to Europe at 

 the beginning of 1878, where he was received 

 with the highest honors. For the details of 

 Stanley's recent explorations see GEOGRAPHI- 

 CAL EXPLORATIONS in this volume, also ANNUAL 

 CYCLOPAEDIA for 1876. 



STEPHENS, ALEXANDER HAMILTON, mem- 

 ber of Congress from Georgia. He was born 

 in Talliaferro County, Ga., February 11, 1812. 

 He graduated at Franklin College, Athens, 

 Ga., in 1832, was admitted to the bar in 1834, 

 and rapidly obtained a large and lucrative prac- 



tice at Crawfordville. He was elected to the 

 Legislature of Georgia in 1836, and was re- 

 elected for five successive terms. In 1842 he 

 was elected to the State Senate. In 1843 he 

 was elected as a Whig to Congress, and held 

 his seat till 1859. In February, 1847, he sub- 

 mitted a series of resolutions in relation to the 

 Mexican "War, which afterward formed the plat- 

 form of the Whig party. He opposed the Clay- 

 ton Compromise in 1848, and took a leading 

 part in the compromises of 1850. The passage 

 of the Kansas and Nebraska Act in 1854 in 

 the House of Representatives was strongly sup- 

 ported by him as chairman of the Committee 

 on Territories. After the breaking up of the 

 Whig party, he acted with the Democrats. At 

 the close of the 35th Congress, Mr. Stephens 

 declined to be again a candidate, and on July 

 2, 1859, he made a speech at Augusta, Ga., 

 announcing his retirement from public life. 

 During the Presidential canvass of 1860 he sus- 

 tained Douglas, and denounced those who ad- 

 vocated a dissolution of the Union in case of 

 Mr. Lincoln's election ; and in November, 1 860, 

 he made a speech before the Legislature of 

 Georgia against secession, on which subject he 

 had an interesting correspondence with Mr. 

 Lincoln in December. He was nevertheless 

 elected to the Secession Convention which met 

 at Milledgeville, January 16, 1861, and there 

 spoke and voted against the secession ordinance. 

 He was a member of the Southern Congress 

 which met in Montgomery, Ala., in February, 

 and was elected Vice-President of the Confed- 

 eracy. On March 21st he delivered a speech in 

 Savannah, in which he declared slavery to be 

 the corner-stone of the new government. On 

 April 23d, as a special commissioner from the 

 Confederate States, he addressed the conven- 

 tion at Richmond, urging the union of Virginia 

 with the Confederacy. He frequently differed 

 from the policy of the Richmond government, 

 especially on the subject of martial law ; and 

 on September 8, 1862, he pronounced the ap- 

 pointment by General Bragg of James M. Cal- 

 houn as civil governor of Atlanta a palpable 

 usurpation. His letter on this subject created 

 a marked sensation through the South. "On 

 February 3, 1865, with R. M. T. Hunter and 

 John A. Campbell, he held an informal confer- 

 ence on a steamer in Hampton Roads with 

 President Lincoln and Mr. Seward, which had 

 no practical result. After Lee's surrender, 

 Stephens returned to his home in Crawford- 

 ville, where, on May 11, 1865, he was arrested 

 and sent to Fort Warren, in Boston harbor ; 

 but on October llth he was released on parole. 

 On February 22, 1866, he delivered a speech 

 before the Legislature of Georgia, favoring the 

 restoration policy of President Johnson. In 

 the same month he was elected to the United 

 States Senate; but as the State had not com- 

 plied with the conditions of reconstruction, he 

 was not permitted to take his seat. In 1872 he 

 was elected to Congress, where he has since 

 continued, being reelected in 1874 and 1876. 



