eneral in the Confederate Army
and who had recently openly identified himself with the Republican
party, was nominated by the Republicans for the office of Governor of
the State. Of the other six men who were associated with him on the
state ticket, only the candidate for Secretary of the State, the
Reverend James Lynch,--an able and eloquent minister of the Methodist
Church,--was a colored man. Lynch was a man of fine ability, of splendid
education, and one of the most powerful and convincing orators that the
Republicans had upon the stump in that campaign. He was known and
recognized as such an able and brilliant speaker that his services were
in great demand from the beginning to the end of the campaign. No
Democratic orator, however able, was anxious to meet him in joint
debate. He died suddenly the latter part of 1872. His death was a great
loss to the State and to the Republican party and especially to the
colored race.

Of the other five candidates on the ticket two,--the candidates for
State Treasurer and Attorney General,--were, like General Alcorn,
Southern white men. The candidate for State Treasurer, Hon. W.H. Vasser,
was a successful business man who lived in the northern part of the
State, while the candidate for Attorney General, Hon. Joshua S. Morris,
was a brilliant member of the bar who lived in the southern part of the
State. The other three, the candidates for Lieutenant-Governor, State
Auditor and Superintendent of Education, were Northern men who had
settled in the State after the War, called by the Democrats, "Carpet
Baggers," but they were admitted to be clean and good men who had
lived in the State long enough to become fully identified with its
industrial and business interests. H.C. Powers, the candidate for
Lieutenant-Governor, and H. Musgrove, the candidate for Auditor of
Public Accounts, were successful cotton planters from Noxubee and Clarke
counties respectively; while H.R. Pease, the candidate for State
Superintendent of Education, had been identified with educational work
ever since he came to the State. It could not be denied that it was a
strong and able ticket,--one that the Democrats would find it very
difficult to defeat. In desperation the Democratic party had nominated
as their candidate for Governor a brother-in-law of President Grant's,
Judge Lewis Dent, in the hope that the President would throw the weight
of his influence and the active support of his administration on the
s