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Nullification Controversy in South Carolina

would reflect disadvantageously upon his brother, William Preston, who was a candidate.[1] The result was a visit to the editor's office by John Preston and a lively fisticuff.[2] About the same time a fight occurred between James H. Hammond, a Columbia editor, and C. F. Daniels, editor of the Camden Journal. This affair grew out of some comments on an election, in response to which Hammond made a special trip to Camden to chastise the editor.[3] The contest waxed hot, and although Union men seemed to be in personal danger if they became too offensive to their opponents, champions were not wanting. Espe-

  1. The same thing had been alleged against Judge William Smith for a similar purpose. Another example of this occurred the next year when the "Nullies" accused Colonel James Chesnut, the Union candidate for the state Senate in Kershaw district, of being a tariff man because he was interested in a cotton factory. The editor of the Camden Journal defended him by saying that he had an interest of just $1,300 in a cotton manufactory established by the late David R. Williams at Society Hill. The interest on this $1,300 was just about three bales of cotton, an article of which Chesnut raised 600 bales annually. One of the wealthiest men in the upper country, the owner of three or four hundred negroes, with an immense landed estate, was on this ground accused of being a "d — d Federalist." "Ridiculous!" said the editor (Journal, September 29, 1832).
  2. Free Press and Hive, April 2, 1831.
  3. Shots were fired by the Journal editor, but a clinch made him miss his mark (Journal, June 4, 1831).