, it was proposed that a ballot be taken, each committeeman
writing the name of the candidate of his choice on a slip of paper, and
depositing the slip in a hat. This was done; but before the ballots were
counted, Judge Linton Stephens, a brother of Alexander H., stated that
such a formality was not necessary. He thereupon moved that Judge Joseph
E. Brown of Cherokee be selected as the compromise man, and that his
name be reported to the convention. This was agreed to unanimously, and
Joseph E. Brown was nominated; and yet, if the written ballots had
been counted, it would have been found that Alfred H. Colquitt, who
afterwards became so distinguished in Georgia, had been nominated by
the committee. He received a majority of one of the written ballots
when they were afterwards counted through curiosity. Twenty-three years
later, Colquitt, who was then governor, made Joseph E. Brown a United
States senator under circumstances that aroused strong opposition, and
immediately afterwards Brown aided Colquitt to a reelection in one of
the bitterest contests the State has ever witnessed.

The unexpected nomination of Brown by the convention of 1857 introduced
into State politics the most potent element that it had ever known. The
nomination, surprising as it was, was not half so surprising as some
of the results that have followed it. At the moment the convention
nominated him, Joe Brown was tying wheat in one of his fields near
Canton, in Cherokee County. He was then judge of the Blue Ridge Circuit;
and on the day that his name was placed before the Democratic Convention
at Milledgeville, he had returned home. After dinner he went out into
his farm to see how his men were getting on. He had four men cutting
wheat with cradles, and he found the binders very much behind. About
half-past two o'clock he pulled off his coat and ordered the binders to
keep up with him. It was on the 15th of June, 1857. The weather was very
warm, but he kept at work all the afternoon. About sundown he went home,
and was preparing to bathe, when a neighbor, who had been to Marietta
and heard the news, rode to his house and told him about the nomination,
which had been made at three o'clock that afternoon. Telling about the
incident afterwards, Joe Brown, with a twinkle in his eye, said that he
had heard that a good many men were anxious to buy that wheat field,
so as to have an opportunity to tie wheat in it while a nominating
convention was in sessio