The 1863 Republican State Convention

Bangor’s hospitality industry was not prepared

by Brian Swartz

Some out-of-town delegates arriving in Bangor for the July 1863 Republican State Convention found the Queen City ill-prepared to handle such an event, but the political rah-rah-sis-boom-bah nevertheless radiated throughout the convention coinciding with the battle of Gettysburg.

Officially styled the “United States Convention,” the conflab drew hordes of delegates from all over Maine. The convention should have seen delegates renominate Governor Abner Coburn of Skowhegan, but after discovering he could not manipulate the indepen- dent-minded Coburn, political bigwig James G. Blaine maneuvered to replace him with Samuel Cony, a War Democrat from Augusta who had switched parties. The convention’s outcome and Coburn’s fate were determined long before delegates crammed into Norumbega Hall on Central Street on Wednesday, July 1.

Bangor “never had her capacity to ‘take in’ strangers more thoroughly tested,” said a Portland delegate who rattled and swayed into Bangor aboard “a long train of cars from the west” on Tuesday, June 30. After disembarking at the Maine Central Railroad station near the Penobscot River waterfront, the “passengers (mostly delegates) made a dash for the Bangor House.”

Businessman Orrin M. Shaw had leased the well-known Bangor House the previous fall. Upon taking over the hotel, he assured his potential guests “that no effort on his [Shaw’s] part will be wanting to render the establishment … every way worthy [of] the consideration of the traveling public.” Located at the intersection of Main and Hammond streets, the hotel then offered billiard rooms, bowling alleys, and “a

Lori Whitten President

large and commodious stable.”

That same day “a long special train came in from the west, with large delegations from the Kennebec [Valley], attended by the Gardiner Band,” a well-known organization that often performed at public functions across the lower half of Maine.

The Portland delegate and his five traveling companions discovered the Bangor House was already booked up. The men rushed to the multi-story Penobscot Exchange Hotel, built in 1827. “Not doubting that it in its broad dimensions would be found plenty of vacant lots,” he discovered that “it was no go.

“All [rooms] were crammed full, and sorrowfully did the cadaverous and dusty crowd turn away” to find rooms “at less pretentious houses,” the delegate said. “The Franklin and the Dwinel were sought and found crowded.”

The six men wondered if they might be “obliged to sleep on some friendly doorstep or some hospitable front yard.” Then the men “dropped into a good-looking house that shall be nameless,” and the landlord offered each man a cot or couch for $20.

Some men paid; the Portland delegate and others declined the pricey digs. All six delegates paid 50 cents for “a supper which could not be furnished except in shreds and bits.” The men swilled down tea that they discovered matched “the color of the bottom of the cups.”

Then the delegate and some companions not staying in that location “drifted to the Bangor House.” To their surprise Shaw offered each man an affordable couch. The men “were not long in transferring our collapsible carpet bag” to the Bangor House.

Meanwhile, their companions who shelled out twenty bucks apiece at the first location discovered the next day they had “had not only fought but bled for their rights, and that more delegates were found in their rooms than they had bargained for.” (cont. on page 6)

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(cont. from page 5)

Awakened during the night by creepy crawlies, a Wiscasset delegate “arose from his bed, struck a light, and found that his couch was literally alive with the biggest kind of bugs that ever congregated to do honor to a stranger,” the Portland delegate learned.

The Wiscasset delegate turned out the landlord and showed him the swarming bugs. The delegate said the couch was unacceptable. “Very strange, but some people never can endure bugs!” the landlord said as he moved his guest to another sleeping surface.

Blaine opened the convention with a pounding gavel around 11 a.m., Wednesday, July 1. Norumbega Hall “was crowded to its utmost capacity,” the Portland delegate observed. Officially 1,274 delegates representing 298 cities and towns packed the hall, where “the heat was intense” and the “patriotism and mercury were at a high figure.”

That afternoon Blaine stood and announced that Coburn (after realizing how strong the Blaine-inspired opposition to his nomination had become) “would cheerfully and most cordially” support the candidate selected at the convention. However, the first round of voting saw Cony receiving only 56 votes more than Coburn.

Standing amidst the crowd, a Skowhegan delegate announced that Coburn had authorized withdrawing his name from consideration. “Most loudly” cheering the news, delegates then voted overwhelmingly to nominate Cony to run as governor.

“Those who voted against” Coburn “did so from no feeling of hostility to him, but because they” thought the Maine Republican Party should approach the election “with a new man,” the Portland delegate said. “The proceedings moved forward with a harmony unbroken by a single ripple.”

After the convention adjourned in late afternoon, “the crowd rushed to the depot” and packed “ten large cars” for transportation to western Maine destinations, the delegate said. He and his companions boarded a train that would reach Portland at 1 a.m., Thursday, July 2.