announcement that had been made during the long crisis through which
the country had just passed. Every head was bowed in grief. No tongue
could find language sufficiently strong to express condemnation of the
fiendish act. The entire country was plunged in mourning. It was not
safe for any one to utter a word against the character of the martyred
president. At no place in the entire country was the terrible calamity
more deeply felt than in St. Paul. All public and private buildings
were draped in mourning. Every church held memorial services. The
services at the little House of Hope church on Walnut street will long
be remembered by all those who were there. The church was heavily
draped in mourning. It had been suddenly transformed from a house of
hope to a house of sorrow, a house of woe. The pastor of the church
was the Rev. Frederick A. Noble. He was one of the most eloquent and
learned divines in the city--fearless, forcible and aggressive--the
Henry Ward Beecher of the Northwest. President Lincoln was his ideal
statesman.

The members of the House of Hope were intensely patriotic. Many of
their number were at the front defending their imperiled country.
Scores and scores of times during the desperate conflict had the
eloquent pastor of this church delivered stirring addresses favoring
a vigorous prosecution of the war. During the darkest days of the
Rebellion, when the prospect of the final triumph of the cause of the
Union seemed furthest off, Mr. Noble never faltered; he believed that
the cause was just and that right would finally triumph. When the
terrible and heart-rending news was received that an assassin's bullet
had ended the life of the greatest of all presidents the effect was
so paralyzing that hearts almost ceased beating. Every member of the
congregation felt as if one of their own household had been suddenly
taken from them. The services at the church on the Sunday morning