Vault Early Papers of the University Box 1 Document Cornerstone Invitation 100

Frankfurt, Ky., 21 Sept., 1860

Rev. Jas. H. Otey D.D. LLS.:

My Dear Bishop:

Your kind invitation to be present at the laying of the Corner Stone of the principal building of the University of the South was recd this a.m. I regret my inability to leave my family at the time as I had proposed to myself great pleasure in the excursion to University Place. -

I am more & more convinced of the wonderful value of your noble enterprise. Its incidental benefits are also invaluable. All the Southern dioceses, working for a common object, become a unit in almost every thing, and quietness & peace reign throughout your entire (over)

borders.

I am fully conviced that it is worse than useless for Kentucky & Missouri to be attempting the support of Colleges, without endow-ments or their equivalent. Kentucky ought at once to enter heartily into this Southern movement and the Conservative clergy wd. gladly do so; but the Bishop is very desirous of having a College and is sustained by those sympathizing? with him, [who are?] so feeble as not to afford him the necessary aid. But after a few years more of misfortune at Shelby, I think all will be desirous of returning it to the people of Shelby. There is no way out of the difficulty but by _cutting_ the Gordian Knot - -retroceding & giving it up. Dr. Waller holds most selfishly his mortgages of $40000 on the property, when he is virtually secure (& _only_ thus) by the lottery, ^he [receiving?] $6.000 per annum

from lottery agents. I brought the college last year to as high a slate of prosperity as is possible, without endowments; but it was done at such a fearful sacrifice on my part as to prevent its continuance. I was willing to give me entire service without charge & meet my own family & friends, but could go no farther. I am now sued to meet bank calls for the support of the Professor, after the assurance of the Bp. that all debt shd. be paid. He still says so - but I can wait no longer. The Bp. means well but can not perform. I told the Bp. that I would go on to the last moment, but when I was permitted to be sued I should resign. The fact is that the Church in Ky. will not endow it, until Dr. Waller removes his mortages and until the people of Shelby cancel the item, in the transfer, which will revert the college to the town in case of failure to keep up the college. One man offerred [sic] me $20000 to begin the endowment if these matters cd. be secured - but neither Dr. Waller? nor the people of Shelby will yield. Indeed the sectarianism of Shelby looks with no favor on an Episcopal College - I proposed to the people of Shelby, who really control the College, & not the Church, that it should be made a feeder for the Southern Uni-versity & they expressed great oppo-sition - but in a year or two some of us will get up a Kentucky Church Grammar School, directly auxili-ary to the Southern University. -

The preservation of our rights

[5?]-

as conservative clergy & Diocese depend somewhat on this union. We are too much in bondage to this & Cincinnati - and are now suffering from the Bishop introducing the ex-editor of the West. Epis. (defunct) into our Diocese, who, with some others, are agitating among them selves & [Redef. Miss. Scre.?] operations &c? - but we are quiet and will act & vote at the right time & in the right way. Our sympathies are really with the South & not with the radicalism of Ohio. -

Would it not be well to organize as soon as possible, if consistent with your plans, Grammar schools for boys at Sewanee, so that ripe scholars trained under your own auspices, may be ready for your University classes.

Yours Very Truly, R. [M'Musdy?].