Thomas Spottswood Hinde (April 19, 1785 – February 9, 1846) was an American newspaper editor, opponent of slavery, writer, historian, real estate investor, Methodist minister and a founder of the city of Mount Carmel, Illinois. Members of the Hinde family were prominent in Virginia, Kentucky, Ohio, and Illinois. His sons Charles T. Hinde became a shipping magnate and Edmund C. Hinde an adventurer. He was the father-in-law of judge Charles H. Constable.
Hinde was an active businessman, pursuing real estate, construction, and publishing opportunities in Kentucky, Ohio and Illinois. In his early years, Hinde publicly opposed slavery. He also used his newspaper, The Fredonian, in Chillicothe, Ohio between 1806 and 1808, to highlight issues about Indian treaties and the conspiracy of Aaron Burr. He served in the U.S. Army during the War of 1812. In later years he was a pioneer in the settlement of Indiana and Illinois, and the expansion of the Methodist Episcopal Church in these areas. He contributed to the Madoc Tradition and was a noted historian and biographer. Hinde cofounded the Wabash Navigation Company, which engaged in real estate speculation and dam construction. The company dammed the Wabash River next to Hinde's property, creating the Grand Rapids Dam. The dam was abandoned by the Federal government in 1931.
Hinde was an ordained Methodist minister and traveled extensively to advance the interests of the church. He was a pioneering circuit rider in the early 1800s in Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, and Missouri. Hinde wrote and published religious articles in many leading publications. Francis Asbury, one of the first two bishops of the Methodist Episcopal Church, considered Hinde important to the church. He frequently met with him and mentioned him in his journals. Historian Lyman Draper spent more than twenty years collecting documents by and about the Hinde family, along with papers of other important figures of the Trans-Allegheny West. The Draper Manuscript Collection at the Wisconsin Historical Society holds 47 volumes of Hinde's personal papers, donated by his family after his death.
Early years Thomas S. Hinde was born April 19, 1785, in Hanover County, Virginia, to Thomas Hinde (1737–1828) and Mary Todd Hubbard (1734–1830), as the seventh of eight children. His father was an English doctor who served as a physician to Patrick Henry and General James Wolfe. Little is known about Hinde's early years except that the family moved from Virginia to Newport, Kentucky, in 1797 when his father was awarded a land grant of for his services in the American Revolutionary War. In a letter to President James Madison many years later, Hinde related that while walking to school in the wilderness of Kentucky, he once successfully fought off a wolf and a panther.* Daniel Boone and Simon Kenton were neighbors of the Hinde family while they lived in Kentucky, and the three men grew up as colleagues. One of Hinde's sisters married Richard Southgate; his nephews William Wright Southgate and William Taylor became prominent lawyers and politicians.
After a conversion by his mother Mary and older sister Susannah in 1798, all of Hinde's family, including his father, converted to Christianity as Methodists. Thomas delayed a while. Shortly afterward the younger Hinde became close friends with Francis Asbury, who became a prominent bishop in the church. Hinde later described the conversion of his youngest sister, Martha Harrison Hinde, in an 1827 article published in the Methodist Review under his pen name, Theophilus Arminius. Hinde recounted Bishop Asbury visiting his father's home in 1803 and telling Martha that she had better find God, because before he could meet her again she would be dead. The bishop's prophecy came true when Martha died in 1811 without having seen Asbury again. Hinde said she had converted before her death and tried to convert the nonbelievers in the room while on her deathbed. He shared a letter in which his sister had tried to convert her close friends. Hinde named his first daughter after his late sister Martha.* Hinde did not immediately convert but attended Methodist camp meetings of the period. During his life, he frequently wrote about the importance of the camp meeting in bringing Christianity and democracy to the west.
In 1801, Hinde got a job as deputy clerk for the Kentucky Court of Appeals. William Kavanaugh, the husband of Hinde's older sister Hannah, assigned him to Achilles Sneed of Frankfort. He received a good legal education with Sneed, who was Clerk of the Court of Appeals. During this time, Hinde became acquainted with many of the state's leading men, and acquired a knowledge of the law. He also developed a reputation as one of Kentucky's most efficient businessmen. Hinde wrote to Henry Clay that he was the first lawyer whom Hinde heard address a court. Hinde resided in a boarding house, shared with many of the leading judges and politicians of the day, where he strengthened his personal and political contacts.
Newspaper publisher From an early age, Hinde opposed slavery. Although their parents owned slaves, he and his siblings repudiated slavery on religious grounds. Hinde's opposition increased and eventually he and other friends became outspoken critics of the institution in Kentucky, where slavery was commonplace in the middle and western parts of the state. In the Great Awakening, Methodists were prominent among those who opposed slavery, although they also converted slaves and welcomed them into congregations. In Kentucky Hinde joined other Methodist ministers in the abolitionist movement.
In a letter to President Madison, Hinde attributed his opposition to slavery to the influence of his mother. He wrote: In 1805, Messrs. Wood and Street, from Richmond, Va., found their way to Kentucky. Friendly considerations led me to patronize them. This was done through the solicitations of a young friend from Virginia. They commenced a paper, published in 1806, called the 'Western World.' Imbibing strong prejudices against slavery, perhaps from my mother's repeating, in my infancy, the nurse's songs composed by Cowper, designed to make such impressions. In June 1806, to the great astonishment of my friends, I left Kentucky, with all the flattering prospects a youth could have, and hastened to Ohio. Connecting circumstances, and from hints that fell from Wood and others, a deep impression had been made on my mind, that an eventful period was fast approaching.
Because of the slavery issue, in 1806 Hinde moved from Kentucky to Chillicothe in the free state of Ohio. In partnership with his brother-in-law R.D. Richardson, beginning in 1806, he edited and published a newspaper titled the Fredonian. Fredonian was a sonorous name for "a citizen of the United States". In later years it was applied to an American-inspired rebellion to separate Texas from Mexico.
From early in his career, Hinde fought the projects of Aaron Burr. He collected and published material in The Fredonian related to what he said was Burr's conspiracy to overthrow the US government. Hinde sent the evidence to Henry Clay, a longtime friend of his family and later secretary of state, but the papers disappeared.
While working at the Kentucky Court of Appeals, Hinde had developed a close relationship with George Madison and his nephew John Madison. In 1829 Hinde wrote to their relation, President James Madison, to provide him with information about the Burr conspiracy for a political history the president was said to be writing. Madison denied the project, but asked Hinde to send copies of The Fredonian to include in his presidential papers. Hinde sent newspaper issues dealing with the Burr Conspiracy. The copies of the newspaper were filed with the President's papers.Boggess, pp. 196–203
After moving to Ohio, Hinde was unanimously elected by the Ohio House of Representatives to the position of clerk pro tempore. He held the position for three years before shifting to focus on his successful speculation in military lands.
Marriages and family On October 19, 1809, with minister William Lynes officiating, Hinde at the age of 24 married Belinda Bradford, the daughter of the late James Bradford, in Hamilton County, Ohio.Pioneer Marriage Records, Hamilton County, Ohio: 1791–1820, Copied by John Day Caldwell, Secretary of the Cincinnati Pioneer Association, before the Cincinnati Courthouse fire in 1884 His father-in-law was a descendant of William Bradford of Plymouth Colony. He had been killed in 1791 in St. Clair's Defeat, and buried in Fort Recovery.
Hinde and Belinda had three children: James B., John Madison, and Martha. The second son was named after Hinde's friend John Madison, a nephew of George Madison and a relative of James Madison. The daughter Martha married Charles H. Constable, who became a prominent Illinois politician. He is notable for his decision as judge to allow four Union deserters to go free during the Civil War. Belinda died in 1827.
In 1828, Hinde married Sarah Neal (Daugherty) Cavileer. They had three children: Edmund C., Charles T. and Belinda. Edmund was a pioneer who participated in the California Gold Rush; after his death, his journals were published. Charles became a business tycoon in Southern California, playing a pivotal role in its development through his shipping expertise. Belinda married Jacob Zimmerman, a successful newspaper editor and owner who in later years held a number of political offices in Illinois.
Conversion to Methodism
Hinde was involved with the newspaper for less than two years. He converted from Deism to Methodism and decided that operating a political journal conflicted with his new religious views. After retiring from the newspaper business, he engaged in locating military lands and in land speculation. For the rest of his life, Hinde published editorials in newspapers and religious publications. He organized several camp meetings with other preachers, saying that the camp meeting could unite the different Protestant denominations.
At times, Francis Asbury ventured into the wilderness to visit Hinde. An 1856 account states, In 1810 Bishop Asbury visited an obscure part of the western country (Kanawha) which was then a wilderness, and pleasantly told the Rev. Thomas S. Hinde that he had visited the region so that the people might see and know their superintendent; remarking, "The shepherd ought to know the flock, and the flock the shepherd: they ought to know what man it is that governs them, and I have come nearly one hundred miles out of my way to see them." The writer exclaims, "O Asbury, the inhabitants of these hills and mountains will long make mention of thee!"
Hinde is thought to have received his license to preach sometime around 1810. His first sermon was in Chillicothe in either 1807 or 1808, and people were so eager to hear him that they filled the church. The sermon was described as having "...no coherence in his discourse." During the sermon, Hinde repeatedly stated, "My bowels, my bowels!"
According to a 19th-century account, As a preacher, he was rather eccentric. He was not very fluent and gifted as a speaker, but had the power of engaging the attention of his hearers, and was very successful and useful in a revival of religion. He entertained rather singular views on the subject of the orders in the ministry, objecting to the order of deacons, and holding that the eldership is the only true order. In consequence of these peculiar views, he would never consent to be ordained a deacon, and therefore never entered into orders at all.