Benjamin Faneuil Porter

(1808-1868)
South Carolina & Alabama

Benjamin Faneuil Porter was born in Charleston, South Carolina. He served apprenticeships to a physician and to William Crafts, a lawyer/poet. In 1825, Porter was admitted to the bar. He was married at age twenty to Eliza Kidd with whom he had ten children. In 1829, after his marriage, and recognition of the crowded legal field in South Carolina, Porter moved to southern Alabama to join relatives there. "Poster hesitated between law and medicine until he met James Dellett, a fellow Southern Carolinian who was the leader of the local bar and a successful political. Recognizing the younger man's talent and ambition, Dellett advised him to 'throw your pill boxes to hell' and took him into partnership." [American National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2004)]

Porter gained a reputation as a trial and appellate lawyer, and served as the Alabama Supreme Court reporter from 1834 to 1840, and after moving to Tuscaloosa in 1835, he served as attorney for the University of Alabama. He also served as an elected judge of the Mobile circuit court.

Porter was also a politician. He served in the legislature, first, in 1832, elected to the House from Monroe Country, three times, serving until 1835. He was elected to serve in the House six times while resident of Tuscaloosa Country (1837-1840), 1842-1843, 1845-1848).

Porter was an opponent of the death penalty. [See Benjamin F. Porter, Argument of Benjamin F. Porter: in support of a bill, introduced by him, in the House of Representatives of Alabama, to abrogate the punishment of death (Tuscaloosa [Alabama]: J. M'Cormick, 1846)]

"Porter's life is a testimony to the mobility of nineteenth-century Americans and to the fluidity of careers open to talented individuals. Porter was, in addition to being a lawyer, politician, occasional physician, and promoter, a writer of legal treatises, poems, and articles in Hunt's Merchants Magazine and De Bow's Review." [Id.]

Hon. Benjamin F. Porter
[The American Whig Review, vol. 9 (17), pp. 447-452 (May, 1848)]

Poetry

Each drop of the blood of our children they've shed,
The signal for fight which our forefathers knew,
Shall be heard in their midst in our vengeful halloo.

CHORUS.—Then gather, &c.

CHORUS.—Then gather, &c.,

They have blasted our fields—they have slaughtered our youth,
And dishonered the names of the maids of the South;
But the rivers shall dry, and the mountains be riven,
Ere vengeance be quenched or our wrongs be forgiven.

CHORUS.—Then gather, &c.

Then rally from forest and rally from ford,
Give their homes to the flame and their sons to the sword;
While a child shall be born in the South, let its cry
Be "Death to the Northman, and vengeance for aye!"

CHORUS.—Then gather, &c.

I'm dreaming now of Hally, sweet Hally, sweet Hally,
I'm dreaming now of Hally,
For the thought of her is one that never dies;
She is sleeping in the valley, the valley, the valley,
She is sleeping in the valley,
And the mocking bird is singing where she lies.

Listen to the mocking bird,
Listen to the mocking bird,
The mocking bird still singing o'er her grave;
Listen to the mocking bird,
Listen to the mocking bird,
Still singing where the weeping wlllows wave.

Ah! well I yet remember, remember, remember,
Ah! well I yet remember,
When we gathered in the cotton side by side,
'Twas in the mild September, September, September,
'Twas in the mild September,
And the mocking bird was singing far and wide.

Listen to the mocking bird,
Listen to the mocking bird,
The mocking bird still singing o'er her grave,
Listen to the mocking bird,
Listen to the mocking bird,
Still singing where the weeping willows wave.

When the charms of spring awaken, awaken, awaken,
When the charms of spring awaken,
And the mocking bird is singing on the bough,
I feel like one forsaken, forsaken, forsaken,
I feel like one forsaken,
Since my Hally is no longer with me now.

Listen to the mocking bird,
Listen to the mocking bird,
The mocking bird still singing o'er her grave,
Listen to the mocking bird,
Listen to the mocking bird,
Still singing where the weeping willows wave.

Fairy Belle

The pride of the village, and the fairest in the dell,
Is the queen of my song, and her name is Fairy Belle;
The sound of her light step may be heard upon the hill,
Like the fall of the snow-drop or the dripping of the rill.

CHORUS.
Fairy Belle, gentle Fairy Belle,
The star of the night and the lily of the day,
Fairy Belle, the queen of all the dell,
Long may she revel on her bright sunny way.

She sings to the meadows, and she carols to the streams,
She laughs in the sunlight, and smiles while in her dreams;
Her hair, like the thistle down, is borne upon the air,
And her heart like the humming bird's, is free from every care.

CHORUS.—Fairy Belle, &c.

Her soft notes of melody around me sweetly fall;
Her eye full of love, is now beaming on my soul;
The sound of that gentle voice, the glance of that eye,
Surround me with rapture that no other heart could sigh.

CHORUS.—Fairy Belle, &c.

[Songs and poem from: Songs of Love and Liberty 4-7 (Raleigh, North Carolina: Branson & Farrar, 1864)("compiled by a North Carolina Lady")(Documenting the American South, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill (online text)]

Writings

Benjamin F. Porter, A Vindication of the Profession of Lawyers (Athens, Georgia: 1849)

Further Research: Essays on and about Benjamin Faneuil Porter can be found in the Gulf South Historical Review, Vol. 11 (1), pp. 22-58 and Vol. 11 (2), pp. 29-30. See also: Robert David Ward & William Warren Rogers, Alabama's Response to the Penitentiary Movement, 1829-1865 (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2003)