, assuring herself of his safety. Although ill at the
time, he had been in the thick of the fight, but was unharmed. Weak
from the exertion he had crawled back to his cabin on his hands and
knees and had lain there ill and alone for several weeks.

Parts of Merritt's letters were published in the Rochester _Democrat_,
and the city took sides in the conflict, some papers claiming that his
letters were fiction. Susan wrote Merritt, "How much rather would I
have you at my side tonight than to think of your daring and enduring
greater hardships even than our Revolutionary heroes. Words cannot
tell how often we think of you or how sadly we feel that the terrible
crime of this nation against humanity is being avenged on the heads of
our sons and brothers.... Father brings the _Democrat_ giving a list
of killed, wounded, and missing and the name of our Merritt is not
therein, but oh! the slain are sons, brothers, and husbands of others
as dearly loved and sadly mourned."[69]

With difficulty, she prepared for the annual woman's rights
convention, for the country was in a state of unrest not only over
Kansas and the whole antislavery question, but also over the
presidential campaign with three candidates in the field. Even her
faithful friends Horace Greeley and Gerrit Smith now failed her,
Horace Greeley writing that he could no longer publish her notices
free in the news columns of his _Tribune_, because they cast upon him
the stigma of ultraradicalism, and Gerrit Smith withholding his
hitherto generous financial support because woman's rights conventions
would not press for dress reform--comfortable clothing for women
suitable for an active life, which he believed to be the foundation
stone of women's emancipation.

[Illustration: Merritt Anthony]

She watched the lively bitter presidential campaign with interest and
concern. The new Republican party was in the contest, offering its
first presidential candidate, the colorful hero and explorer of the
far West, John C. Fremont. She had leanings toward this virile young
party which stood firmly against the extension of slavery in the
territories, and discussed its platform with Elizabeth and Henry B.
Stanton, both enthusiastically for "Fremont and Freedom." Yet she was
distrustful of political parties, for they eventually yielded to
expediency, no matter how high their purpose at the start. Her ideal
was the Garrisonian doctrine, "No Union with Slaveholders" and
"Immediate