The
year was 1850; Zachary Taylor had died in July and Millard Fillmore had
become President of the United States. Conditions were already building
toward Civil War, when in August a Fellow-Craft named Albert Pike knocked
on the door of Western Star Lodge No. 2 in Little Rock, Arkansas, desiring
to receive the Degree of Master Mason. It was highly improbable that
those present that night suspected their 40-year old candidate would soon
rise to the highest pinnacle of their Fraternity. Pike was at once
attracted to the intellectual side of Masonry and later said: “I am a
Mason and nothing that concerns Masonry is uninteresting to me.”1
In 1852 Albert Pike and 16 other Masons became
Charter Members of Magnolia Lodge No. 60, and in 1853-54 he served as its
Worshipful Master. He served the Grand Lodge of Arkansas as Grand Orator
in 1864. He was Chairman of its Committee on Masonic Law and Usage, its
Foreign Correspondence Committee, and its Library Committee as well as
Trustee and President of St. John’s College, which was established by the
Grand Lodge of Arkansas. In addition, he was Grand Representative of four
Grand Lodges.
It was said of Pike that he moved his Lodge
affiliation as often as he moved his domicile, and records indicate that
when he moved to New Orleans he transferred his membership to Marion Lodge
No. 68 and later to Kilwinning Lodge No. 341 in Memphis, Tennessee, upon
settling in that city. In 1880, after moving to Washington, D.C., Pike
affiliated with a local Lodge, Pentalpha Lodge No. 23; three years later
he moved his membership back to Magnolia Lodge No. 60 in Little Rock,
where he remained a member until his death.
Albert Pike received the Capitular Degrees in 1850
and was a member of the Convention which formed the Grand Chapter of
Arkansas in 1851. He served as Grand High Priest of that State in
1853-54. He received the Degrees of Royal and Select Master in
Washington, D.C. on December 22, 1852, served as Thrice Illustrious Master
of Occidental Council No. 1 in Little Rock, and assisted in forming the
Grand Council of Arkansas in 1860. Receiving the Orders of Templar
Masonry in Washington in 1853, Pike served as the First Eminent Command of
Hugh de Payens Commandery No. 1, in Little Rock where he remained a member
until his death.
When the Provincial Grand Lodge for the United
States of America of the Royal Order of Scotland was instituted, "Sir and
General Albert Pike" was named the Provincial Grand Master, ad vitam,
in a warrant dated October 4, 1877, from Edinburough, Scotland.
Albert Pike in has last Allocution as Grand
Commander remarked: "I never heard of the Scottish Rite until 1853." That
year he moved his law office to New Orleans, Louisiana, where the Scottish
Rite had been active for many years.
The survival of the Scottish Rite and the Mother Supreme Council in
particular was probably due to the fact that in 1853 Grand Secretary
Albert G. Mackey, 33', and Albert Pike were Grand High Priests in their
respective States of South Carolina and Arkansas. They were friends and
had worked together in Royal Arch Masonry. On March 20, 1853, when Mackey
Communicated the Scottish Rite Degrees from Fourth to Thirty-second to
Albert Pike in Charleston, South Carolina, he did more than Communicate
the Degrees, he urged Pike to study them in detail and become active in
the work of the Rite. Pike was appointed Deputy Inspector General in
Arkansas 10 days after he received the Degrees from Mackey. A Deputy
Inspector General at that time did not have to be a Thirty-third Degree
Mason. At The Supreme Council Session in 1860 Pike said that four years
before that time: "...a Ritual Committee had been appointed; that although
he was then only a Thirty-second Degree, he was appointed on it; that the
Committee had never met and that he had himself revised the Rituals from
the Fourth to the Thirty-second Degree, and had printed his work for the
benefit of The Supreme Council at a cost to himself of twelve hundred
dollars."2 He did not receive the Thirty-third
Degree until April 25, 1857, and in the same year was made Special Deputy
of The Supreme Council for Louisiana. On March 20, 1858, Albert Pike was
elected an Active Member of The Supreme Council at a session in
Charleston, South Carolina. In Mackey's official notification to him on
July 7, he wrote in part: "You can well imagine the pleasure with which I
tell you that my ardent wish for so many years has at length been
accomplished and that I am now enabled officially to inform you that you
have been elected an Active Member of the Supreme Council for the Southern
Jurisdiction in the place of J. C. Norris, deceased."3
Upon the resignation of Grand Commander John Henry Honour, Albert Pike
was officially elected Grand Commander of The Supreme Council , Southern
Jurisdiction, on January 3, 1859. In his letter of acceptance to Grand
Secretary Albert G. Mackey, dated January 5, 1859, Pike wrote"
I shall accept the office of Sovereign Grand Commander with
reluctance, since I know that, if the duties of the office are well
performed, they involve both labor and responsibility. But I have the
advancement of the Scottish Rite too much at heart to decline to accept
an office, how responsible so ever, conferred on me by so flattering a
vote; and I will omit no exertion to propagate and extend the Scottish
Rite, and to make it worthy to be propagated and extended among Masons
of intellect and learning.
He held the office of Grand Commander until his death, a total of 32
years, which is a remarkable record.
A complete list of his Masonic Degrees, offices and honors was compiled
by Brother W. L. Boyden, former Librarian of the Supreme Council. Among
the 130 items, Pike was listed as an honorary member of 7 Grand Lodges and
21 Supreme Councils, as well as Honorary Grand Commander of 6 Supreme
Councils.
According to Past Grand Commander George Fleming Moore,
5 Albert Pike gave up much for the sake of Freemasonry. He was a
philosopher "profoundly versed as he was in all the wisdom of the East and
in the Philosophies of the World," but he is unknown to the world as a
philosopher because "he gave the benefit of all his stores of learning and
the results of his original researches to his Masonic Brethren." Pike was
known to the world as "one of America's foremost poets," but Moore says
"in his later years he wrote few poems for publication, not because the
divine afflatus was extinct, but because he had turned it into Masonic
channels." Moore further stated "His divine gift of poesy was devoted to
the service of Masonry and the Scottish Rite." Albert Pike was a patriot
and as such his patriotism was infused into the teachings of Scottish
Rite. He was a jurist, having begun the practice of law early in life
"and did not abandon it until he determined to devote all his energies to
the cause of Freemasonry." Pike could probably have gained much fame and
fortune by following either a judicial or political career, but he chose
to use his ability in the service of the Scottish Rite. In his article,
"Albert Pike, the Mason," Moore further wrote:
It was Pike, the Mason, who, by the divine alchemy of the love of his
fellow men, transmuted all his mental possessions into the pure gold of
wisdom, poesy, patriotism, and law, and embodied them in our Scottish
Rite Rituals as they were revised and spiritualized by him.6
Once asked by Robert Toombs why he devoted himself entirely to Masonry
instead of giving it up, going into politics and making a reputation in
the world as a United States Senator, Pike replied: "Well, I will tell you
why. I think I can do more good to the world as a Mason than I could in
the Senate as a politician. I think you Senators and the men in the House
are doing your very best to break up this Union; and certainly Masons are
not trying to do anything of the sort."7
Allsopp says that it is unlikely that "any man has ever or will ever do
as much mental drudgery for any organization as he (Pike) performed for
the Scottish Rite."8
Many of Pike's intimate Masonic associates called him "The Patriarch,"
and they said that he became "the most eminent and best loved Mason in the
World, not merely by virtue of the exalted position which he held, but
because of his high character and lovable nature, his scholarly
attainments, his writings and treatises on the law and symbolism of
Masonry, and the extraordinary fund of knowledge which he possessed on
every subject, in and out of the order."9
Years after his election as Grand Commander, Albert Pike said:
The Supreme Council, when I became Grand Commander... had a Treasurer
General and no Treasury. I do not suppose that Brother LePrince, who
was called Treasurer General, ever in his life received or paid out a
dollar of moneys of The Supreme Council. He kept no books; the
Secretary General kept none; and whatever came into hands, for degrees,
was his. If any bodies had made returns for twenty years back, I could
not find them. There were no records. The Supreme Council had not a
printed volume, nor any property of any kind to the value of a dollar,
nor credit enough to buy a book.10
As bad as this situation was, the outbreak of the Civil War made it
even worse. During the war Masonic activities almost stopped. In 1865
the Southern Jurisdiction of the Scottish Rite was in a chaotic condition
and Grand Commander Pike was in Canada. The former brigadier general in
the Confederate Army had gone there since he not included in Lincoln's
Amnesty Proclamation. It might be well to note that Lincoln was not a
Mason. President Andrew Johnson, a Mason, did grant Pike amnesty on
August 30, 1865. He then returned to Memphis, Tennessee, and summoned The
Supreme Council to assemble in Session in Charleston on November 16, 1865,
to resume Scottish Rite activities. Never in American history had there
been a greater need for an institution dedicated to bringing "order out of
chaos."
Under the aggressive leadership of Albert Pike, reconstruction of the
Rite began immediately. The Supreme Council was recognized and working
unity was restored. According to Brother and Dr. James D. Carter, former
Grand Historian of the Supreme Council: Pike "...molded and strengthened
the organizational and administrative structure of the Rite, wrote and
shaped its jurisprudence, supervised its expansion into all areas of the
Southern Jurisdiction, defended the Rite from clandestine organizations,
set the tone of 'regularity' for Scottish Rite Masonry throughout the
world, fostered and guided relations between Supreme Councils and in other
ways strengthened the Masonic fabric...."11
It would be impossible to overestimate the importance of Grand
Commander Albert Pike's more than 30 years of work for Scottish Rite. Of
primary importance, he edited our Rituals of the Degrees and compiled
