Hamilton Gamble Bed         
19th Century
American
Wood
Eugene Field House

Descriptive Detail
Placed diagonally across the corner of the back bedroom, this imposing piece of furniture is a typical mid-nineteenth-century bed with a high headboard, a low curved footboard, wide side rails and substantial bedposts topped with fanciful finials. Made of mahogany and elaborately carved and decorated with scrolls and floral motifs, it seems to combine elements of both Rococo and Gothic revival styles, reflecting the nineteenth century’s propensity for eclecticism.

Local Historical Connections
The bed, not original to the Eugene Field House, was donated to the museum by the Gamble family in 1969. It can be seen as an acknowledgement by the family of both Gamble’s and Field’s involvement in the Dred Scott case. Hamilton Gamble was a Missouri Supreme Court judge when the case was brought before it. And, after Scott’s freedom was denied, Roswell Field then worked without fee to bring the case before the U.S. Supreme Court.   

Like Robert Campbell, Hamilton Gamble had Irish roots—both parents were Irish immigrants. Gamble also had southern roots. Born in Virginia, he moved to Missouri in 1818, first serving as a deputy to his brother, who was a clerk of the St. Louis Circuit Court, then setting up his own law practice. In 1824 he was appointed Missouri’s Secretary of State, a position he held until 1826. Elected to the Missouri State Supreme Court in 1848, he was asked to run by one hundred fifty of the one hundred fifty-nine lawyers who were then practicing in St. Louis. (Roswell Field was one of the lawyers who supported him.) He agreed, but did not run as a member of any political party, despite the fact that he had been elected to the legislature as a Whig in 1846.  Without campaigning for the Supreme Court position, he won by a landslide, a testimony to his ability and popularity. Gamble was thus one of the three Missouri Supreme Court judges who heard the appeal of the Dred Scott case. Despite years of legal precedent in which slaves taken to free territory had been granted their freedom, two of the judges chose to reverse the lower court decision and deny Dred Scott his freedom. Gamble was the lone dissenter, arguing strongly for following precedent.

National Historical Connections
As a border state during the Civil War, Missouri held both strong pro-southern and secessionist sympathies as well as strong anti-slavery and Union ones. Although a slave owner himself, Hamilton Gamble’s religious convictions, his policies of local control and moderation, and his strong support of the Union resulted in his appointment as provisional governor of the state during this turbulent and unstable time. 

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