A memorable meeting between two distinguished visitors took place at the Astor House in New York City during the morning of February 20, 1861. President-elect Abraham Lincoln, on his way to Washington, D.C., to be inaugurated as the nation’s chief executive, greeted venerable nonagenarian Joshua Dewey, a Connecticut native and Brooklyn resident who voted in every presidential election since the ratification of the Constitution. He had also shouldered a musket during the Revolution.
Dewey’s Continental Army service, brief and unofficial, came unexpectedly in the immediate aftermath of a raid by Benedict Arnold, the former Continental Army officer who had defected to the British. One September day in 1781, he led an attack against Forts Trumbull and Griswold along the Thames River at New London, Conn. The British left the village in ashes and destroyed Fort Trumbull. Joshua, then in his mid-teens and from nearby Lebanon, joined the garrison of Fort Griswold and did his part to keep it in the hands of the Patriots.
Dewey shouldered a musket against the British again during the War of 1812, as a sergeant in the 14th Regiment, New York Militia. By this time, Dewey had graduated from Yale, moved to Cooperstown, N.Y., where he farmed and taught in the school where author James Fenimore Cooper learned his ABC’s, served in the Empire State legislature, and accepted an appointment from President John Adams as a Collector of Internal Revenue. Life was good for Dewey, his wife, Lora, and children, who numbered a dozen—eight of whom lived to maturity.
By the time of the 1860 election, now widowed Dewey split his time with family in Brooklyn and Watertown. N.Y. Good health and a clear mind were his constant companions. Friends, neighbors, and acquaintances cherished him as a living connection to epic events that shaped the nation. As the country drifted towards civil war, he and the last remaining survivors of the Revolution were honored as examples of that generation who fought for freedom and liberty.
He has voted at every Presidential election since that of Washington, and takes pride in the fact that he cast his last vote for ‘Honest Old Abe.’
The man responsible for the Dewey-Lincoln meeting was 28-year-old Elnathan Walker Packard, a lawyer who worked for a commercial and collections agency in New York City. How he met Dewey and learned his story is lost in time. Packard determined that Lincoln needed to know about Dewey, and acted. He had a framed photograph of Dewey made, wrote a letter of introduction, and had both delivered to Lincoln on February 19, the day he and his entourage arrived in New York City for an overnight stop.
The next morning, Packard received a note penned by Lincoln’s secretary John Hay with an informal invitation to call on Lincoln. Packard and Dewey promptly paid a visit to President-Elect and Mrs. Lincoln. A Brooklyn Evening Star correspondent reported, “Mr. Dewey was much pleased with them both.” The Star also published Packard’s letter in full:
Hon. Abraham Lincoln:—
Dear Sir—Allow me here with to present you with a photograph of my respected friend, the honorable Joshua Dewey, of Brooklyn, N.Y., who has reached the ripe age of ninety-four years. He has voted at every Presidential election since that of Washington, and takes pride in the fact that he cast his last vote for “Honest Old Abe.”
He entered the army of the Revolution as a volunteer at the tender age of fifteen; he has held many responsible public positions, and in his lifetime has witnessed the birth, rise and progress of this great country. Heaven has bounteously lengthened out his life, and he has come down to us from another generation to remind us of the cost and value of our institutions, and of our duty in preserving them. Of no man and all the country can this be more truly said. He is the oldest graduate of Yale college, and the oldest of the legislators of the State of New York—one of the last of a generation of men who pledged their “lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor” in defense of civil and religious liberty, and who wrought out in tears and blood the great government over which you have been called to preside.
Full of years and of honors, yet with eye undimmed and intellect unimpaired, with a firm step he now treads our streets and gladdens our firesides, and with undiminished devotion prays for the preservation of our country. He stands like a solitary watchman upon the ramparts of the Union, imploring us to protect and preserve it from the ruthless hands that would tear it asunder and bids us bring its administration back to the standard of honesty and simplicity which characterized its earlier days. He desires me to assure you of his entire confidence in your ability, integrity and patriotism, and to express the highest hope that with the assistance of Him who has never forsaken this nation, you will be able to accomplish the mission you have before you, and restore harmony, peace and fraternal affection to the various sections of our now distracted country. Hoping that the simple memento may not be unacceptable to one who has been called to administer the government of so great, generous and confiding a people, I am, respectfully, your humble servant, E. W. Packard.
Though Joshua died in February 1864 and did not live to see the Constitution preserved, it may be fairly stated that he contributed to the cause when he inspired the Lincolns and New Yorkers in 1861. Packard survived the war, and died in 1888 at age 56.
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