in the said rebellion; and, whereas, many persons who had so engaged in said rebellion have, since the issuance of said proclamation, failed or neglected to take the benefits offered thereby; and whereas many persons who have been justly deprived of all claim to amnesty and pardon thereunder by reason of their participation, directly or by implication, in said rebellion and continued hostility to the Government of the United States since the date of said proclamation, now desire to apply for and obtain amnesty and pardon:

To the end, therefore, that the authority of the Government of the United States may be restored, and that peace, order and freedom may be established, I, Andrew Johnson, President of the United States, do proclaim and declare that I hereby grant to all persons who have directly or indirectly participated in the existing rebellion, except as hereinafter excepted, amnesty and pardon, with restoration of all rights of property, except as to slaves, and except in cases where legal proceedings, under the laws of the United States, providing for the confiscation of property of persons engaged in rebellion have been instituted, but on the condition, nevertheless, that every such person shall take and subscribe the following oath or affirmation, and thenceforward keep and maintain said oath inviolate, and which oath shall be registered for permanent preservation and shall be of the tenor and effect following, to wit:

“I, .. do solemnly swear (or affirm), in the presence of Almighty God, that I will henceforth faithfully support and defend the Constitution of the United States and the Union of the States thereunder, and that I will in like manner abide by and faithfully support all laws and proclamations which have been made during the existing rebellion with reference to the emancipation of slaves. So help me God."

The following classes of persons are exempted from the benefits of this proclamation:

First. All who are or shall have been pretended civil or diplomatic officers or otherwise domestic or foreign agents of the pretended Confederate Government.

Second. All who left judicial stations under the United States to aid in the rebellion.

Third. All who shall have been military or naval officers of said pretended Confederate Government, above the rank of colonel in the army or lieutenant in the navy.

Fourth. All who left seats in the Congress of the United States to aid the rebellion.

Fifth. All who resigned or tendered resignations of their commissions in the army or navy of the United States to evade duty in resisting the rebellion.

Sixth. All who have engaged in any way in treating otherwise than lawfully as prisoners of war persons found in the United States service as officers, soldiers, seamen, or in other capacities.

Seventh. All persons who have been or are absentees from the United States for the purpose of aiding the rebellion.

Eighth. All military and naval officers in the rebel service who were educated by the Government in the Military Academy at West Point, or the United States Naval Academy.

Ninth. All persons who held pretended offices of governors of States in insurrection against the United States.

Tenth. All persons who left their homes within the jurisdiction and protection of the United States and passed beyond the Federal military lines into the so-called Confederate States for the purpose of aiding the rebellion.

Eleventh. All persons who have been engaged in the destruction of the commerce of the United States upon the high seas, and who have made raids into the United States from Canada, or been engaged in destroying the commerce of the United States upon the lakes and rivers that separate the British provinces from the United States.

Twelfth. All persons who, at the time when they seek to obtain the benefits hereof by taking the oath herein prescribed, are in military, naval or civil confinement or custody, or under bonds of the civil, military or naval authorities or agents of the United States, as prisoners of war, or persons retained for offenses of any kind, either before or after conviction.

Thirteenth. All persons who have voluntarily participated in said. rebellion, and the estimated value of whose taxable property is over $20,000.

Fourteenth. All persons who have taken the oath of amnesty as prescribed in the President's proclamation of December 8, A. D. 1863, or an oath of allegiance to the Government of the United States since the date of said proclamation, and who have not thenceforward kept and maintained the same inviolate.

Provided, that special application may be made to the President for pardon by any person belonging to the excepted classes, and such clemency will be liberally extended as may be consistent with the facts of the case and the peace and dignity of the United States. The Secretary of State will establish rules and regulations for administering and recording the said amnesty oath, so as to insure its benefit to the people and guard the Government against fraud.

THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNOR.

The Southern people were much at sea. They were particularly anxious for the displacement of the military authority-more especially because, as before stated, it was represented to some extent by negro soldiers. In South Carolina several meetings were held, in which the desire of the white people for a restoration of the State

to her place in the Union, and, most earnestly, for the reestablishment of civil government, took the form of resolutions unanimously adopted. Committees appointed by some of these meetings went to Washington to lay before the President the condition of affairs and to ask the appointment of a "provisional governor," to the end that steps might be taken to accomplish the objects desired.

President Johnson was not averse to the enforcement of his own policy in South Carolina. On the arrival of the first of the committees in Washington he appeared to have had the subject already under consideration. Several gentlemen had been mentioned in connection with the post of provisional governor-among them exGovernor William Aiken, of Charleston; William W. Boyce, of Fairfield, lately a prominent member of the Confederate Congress; ex-Governor John L. Manning, of Clarendon; Mr. Samuel McAlily, of Chester, and Col. Benjamin F. Perry, of Greenville. The last named was selected.

Benjamin Franklin Perry was born in Pickens District-in that portion now included in Oconee County-November 20, 1805. He worked on his father's farm and attended the country school alternately till he reached the age of sixteen, when he was sent to an academy of note in Asheville, N. C. He prepared to enter the South Carolina College, but changed his purpose-a mistake which he always regretted. Shortly after the completion of his sixteenth year he wrote an article in favor of John C. Calhoun for the presidency, and at nineteen delivered a Fourth of July oration in Greenville. Having read law in Greenville and Columbia, he was admitted to practice in 1827, and at once located in the former town. In 1832 he became editor of the Greenville Mountaineer, and in its columns boldly attacked the Nullification party-not sparing its then leader, Mr. Calhoun. The sturdy defense of his principles and his persistent warfare upon his opponents led to the formation of the Union party in South Carolina, and he was the leading spirit of its convention in 1832. In 1834 he ran for Congress from the district in which Mr. Calhoun resided, and was defeated by a majority of fifty votes in seven thousand-his opponent being Warren R. Davis, a gentleman of great popularity. In 1836 he was elected to the lower branch of the State Legislature, and there served till 1844, when he was sent to

the Senate; and he sat in that body for twenty years. In 1850 he established the Southern Patriot, at that time the only Union paper in South Carolina. In the Legislature that year he spoke earnestly against secession. He was a member of the National Democratic Convention, which met in Charleston in 1860, and remained in the body when many of the Southern members had withdrawn-all of the South Carolina delegates having retired except Colonel Perry, Lemuel Boozer, of Lexington, and Arthur Simkins, of Edgefield.

In the excitement following Lincoln's election in November, 1860, Colonel Perry declared openly and earnestly his opposition to secession. But when South Carolina acted he went with his State. In the early part of 1861 there came an opportunity for him to show the sincerity of his declaration of the purpose to go with his people. There was lukewarmness, not to say disaffection, in the mountain section of Greenville District, where the Union sentiment had prevailed, and where Colonel Perry had a very large following. On the request of friends he went among those people and urged them to follow his example-to go with their State. From among those mountaineers there went into the Confederate army a body of the bravest and best of its soldiers.

Colonel Perry held the office of district judge of the Confederate States Court, and his allegiance to the government which he thus served was as constant as had been his devotion to the principles for which he earnestly fought before the controversy between North and South culminated in disunion. Elected to the Senate of the United States by the Legislature in 1865, he was never permitted to take his seat. He was sent as a delegate to the National Democratic Convention of 1876.

Governor Perry died at his home, "Sans Souci," near Greenville, December 3, 1886.

By a proclamation dated June 13, 1865, President Johnson appointed Benjamin F. Perry "provisional governor of the State of South Carolina, whose duty it shall be at the earliest practicable period to prescribe such rules and regulations as may be necessary and proper for convening a convention to be composed of delegates to be chosen by that portion of the people of the said State who are loyal to the United States, and no others, for the purpose of altering or amending the Constitution thereof, and with authority to

exercise, within the limits of said State, all the powers necessary and proper to enable such loyal people of the State of South Carolina to restore said State to its constitutional relations to the Federal Government, and to present such a republican form of State government as will entitle the State to the guaranty of the United States therefor, and its people to protection by the United States against invasion, insurrection and domestic violence; provided, that in any election which may hereafter be held for choosing delegates to any State convention as aforesaid no person shall be qualified as an elector, or shall be eligible as a member of such convention, unless he shall have previously taken and subscribed the oath of amnesty, as set forth in the President's proclamation of May 29, A. D. 1865, and is a voter qualified as prescribed by the Constitution and laws of the State of South Carolina in force before the 20th day of December, A. D. 1860, the date of the so-called ordinance of secession; and the said convention when convened, or the Legislature that may be thereafter assembled, will prescribe the qualifications of the electors and the eligibility of persons to hold office under the Constitution and laws of the State-a power which the people of the several States composing the Federal Union have rightfully exercised from the origin of the Government to the present time."

Accepting this appointment, Governor Perry, by a proclamation dated July 20, 1865, directed that the civil officers of the State should resume their functions, that an election of delegates to a convention to carry out the purposes indicated in the President's declaration accompanying the same be held on the 4th day of September next ensuing, and that such convention assemble in Columbia on the 13th day of that month. All citizens were urged to take the amnesty oath, because that act would evidence their cooperation in the endeavors of the President to restore civil order, and because it was a condition precedent to the exercise of the right to vote. Citizens of the excepted classes mentioned in the President's proclamation of amnesty were urged to apply at once for pardon-the Governor expressing his desire to expedite action upon all applications.

Petitions for pardons were now sent on in very large numbers, and favorable consideration followed in each case, as a matter of The number of persons in the excepted classes in South Carolina, pardoned by the President, was 845, of whom 650 were of those having as much as $20,000 in property-the remainder con

course.