Confederate
President
HUDSON STRODE
JEFFERSON DAVIS
&K/i<femfe PnsAnt
In nuuxon oiroaes jgprson urn: uon-
Preskfenl, the second volume of
new view o
clash between the Confederate generals
Union Army.
of military fortunes wi
when he saw -his high hopes of the Southern
cause shatter in the caves oi
on the fields of Gettysburg.
the role wives and sweethearts played in
the war; and the many personal conflicts
By examining firsthand sources and thou-
92 D2624st
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Strode, Hudson, 1892-
4eftersoa Davis,
92 D2624st
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Jefferson Davis,
MAIN
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Jefferson Davis: Confederate President
BOOKS BY HUDSON STRODE
JEFFERSON DAVIS: AMERICAN PATRIOT
JEFFERSON DAVIS: CONFEDERATE PRESIDENT
JEFFERSON DAVIS: TRAGIC HERO
DENMARK IS A LOVELY LAND
SWEDEN: MODEL FOR A WORLD
NOW IN MEXICO
TIMELESS MEXICO
FINLAND FOREVER
SOUTH BY THUNDERBIRD
THE PAGEANT OF CUBA
THE STORY OF BERMUDA
IMMORTAL LYRICS: An Anthology of English Lyrics
SPRING HARVEST: An Anthology of Alabama Stories
This portrait in oils of Jefferson Davis was painted by Daniel Himtington
in 1874, nine years after the War Between the States. It was commissioned
by the War Department and hung with portraits of other former United
States Secretaries of War. It is now in the Pentagon and is here reproduced
by permission of the Department of the Army.
JEFFERSON DAVIS
CONFEDERATE PRESIDENT
BY HUDSON STRODE
Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc.
NEW YORK
*959 B * HUDSON STRODE
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. NO PART OF THIS PUBLICATION
MAY BE REPRODUCED OR TRANSMITTED IN ANY FORM
OR BY ANY MEANS, ELECTRONIC OR MECHANICAL,
INCLUDING PHOTOCOPY, RECORDING, OR ANY INFORMATION
STORAGE AND RETRIEVAL SYSTEM, WITHOUT PERMISSION
IN WRITING FROM THE PUBLISHER.
B.4.66
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOG CARD NUMBER: 59-
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
For
THE"RESE
KANSAS CITY (MO.) PUBLIC LIBRARY
6SO9O49
"It behooves every man who values liberty of conscience for him-
self, to resist invasions of it in the case of others! 9
THOMAS JEFFERSON in a letter
to Benjamin Rush, 1803
"History, when the case is fully understood, will do justice to the
men who have most suffered from hasty judgment and unjust
censure!*
JEFFERSON DAVIS in a letter of
March 13, 1862.
CONTENTS
Introduction xi
i A New Nation Is Made as War Looms 3
n "Vacillation and Doubledealing Jugglery" 24
ra Awesome Decisions and Sumter's Fall 35
iv Lincoln Calls for Troops 48
v Lee's Choice 59
vi "The Heart and Brains of the Government" at Home
and at Office 67
vn Last Weeks in Montgomery 77
vm "The Mantle of Washington Falls Gracefully" 90
rx Davis Goes to the Battle at Manassas 114
x Fantastic Rout 123
xi After the Victory, Troubles Multiply 137
xn The Difference between Johnston and Johnston 151
xm Beauregard Rows with the Secretary of War 160
xiv Ball's Bluff and Lee's "Mortification" 171
xv Dramatic Arrest at Sea 180
xvi "You Remember the Man" 190
xvn Jefferson Davis Enters "His Martyrdom" 201
xvm The Clash of Ironclads 210
xix "The Test of Merit" and a Church Named Shiloh 221
xx The President Makes Two Important Decisions 237
xxi Richmond Imperiled 258
ix
X CONTENTS
xxii The Fury and Frustration of Seven Days 271
xxiii High Hope at Home and Abroad 287
xxrv Antietam and a Strange Proclamation 299
xxv Bragg Invades Kentucky and Gladstone Speaks at
Newcastle 315
xxvi The President Goes West 330
xxvn Congress Dillydallies 357
xxvni Richmond Entertains while Grant Is Stymied in the
West 372
xxix A Mocking Fate Fells Stonewall Jackson 389
xxx The Climactic Decision 400
xxxi Joe Johnston Maddens the War Department 411
xxxn "An Unwonted Expression of Sadness" 422
xxxni Vicksburg Falls and Lee Retreats 438
xxxiv "Misfortunes Develop Secret Foes" 450
xxxv "Forgive Me for Leaning . . . upon Your Great
Heart" 462
xxxvi September Shadows and a Victory 470
xxxvn Disaster Follows High Expectations 483
xxxvm The Confederacy's Greatest Need 499
xxxix The President Rides Alone Undaunted 507
Acknowledgments 519
Sources and Notes on Sources 523
Index 545
INTRODUCTION
IT WAS the fate of Jefferson Davis to be thrust into a historical time
woefully out of joint and to be chosen to try to set it right for his side.
If Froissart is right, the most profitable thing in the world for the
understanding of human life is history; so the biography of a man who
played an important role in a particular period of history should be
enlightening. For this better understanding, I have combined the state-
craft and the military operations of a struggling new nation under
mighty handicaps with intimate glimpses of its leader's everyday life.
I have endeavored however far I may have missed the mark to de-
vise what Ortega y Gasset calls "a unity of dramatic dynamism be-
tween the two elements, the I [of Jefferson Davis] and the world,
which make his life." In other words, I have sought to create that
sense of immediacy which gives impact to exciting events. Though I
describe the times in which Jefferson Davis lived, the emphasis is
on the man himself, what he sees, thinks, and feels, while history is
occurring.
Probing into the mind and heart of Jefferson Davis these past seven
years, I have come up with ideas at variance with the cliches long
accepted by a large portion of the public. These stereotyped judgments
had their origin in his Southern as well as his Northern foes; they
have been hardened into acceptance by the thoughtless repetitions of
decades. Shelby Foote discovered the same thing in his years of re-
search for The Civil War. "I have never in my life been so amazed
at anything as at the results of my research on Davis," he wrote me.
"All my reading life I have heard things told as fact, and printed as
such by reputable historians, which I now find were invented from
xi
Xll INTRODUCTION
the whole cloth. It is as if a gigantic conspiracy had been formed for
the purpose of misrepresenting Davis so as to hide his true nature
from the world."
Again and again I have found that controversies in which Jefferson
Davis was involved have been completely misrepresented, though all
the evidence is there to be read by anyone willing to take the trouble.
The stale accusation that he "meddled" with his generals cannot be
sustained by reading the Official Records or Dunbar Rowland's ten-
volume collection of personal and official letters. Davis was the victim
of vituperative fabrications by inimical editors and a few disappointed
generals. These fabrications have seeped down the years into the minds
of students on both sides of Mason and Dixon's line.
Though Jefferson Davis is still a controversial figure, there is vir-
tually no disagreement today as to whether or not he was the one best
fitted for the position of President of the Confederacy. As Professor
Kenneth Stampp of the University of California declared in 1955:
"Those who contend that the South made a mistake by elevating Davis
to the Presidency of the Confederacy have not yet come up with a man
who would have done a better job in that difficult position." Even North
Carolina's acid Robert Winston wrote in 1930: "Undoubtedly Davis
was fitted for the job no one better. Rhett, Yancey, Cobb, Toombs
these were of small calibre; they could not have stood up against
the world for four devastating years and taken punishment." With
remarkable insight and fairness, the Boston historian Charles Francis
Adams, grandson of John Quincy and son of the eminent wartime
Minister to England, affirmed: "No fatal mistakes either of adminis-
tration or strategy were made which can be fairly laid to his account.
He did the best possible with the means that he had at his command."
In dealing with a period in which political stresses were at a maxi-
mum and war was raging on far-flung fields, the technical problems
have been considerable. Because it is essential for the subject of a
biography to be a dramatic projection, the selection of material used
has continually posed questions.
When James Boswell finally confronted the mass of primary ma-
terial he had gathered on Dr. Johnson, he was so overwhelmed that
tears would stream uncontrollably in public. In the light of the volumi-
nous material on Jefferson Davis, it is not hard to understand Boswell's
emotional reaction. When I began writing this biography in June,
, I intended to make a one-volume study. But after initial re-
INTRODUCTION
searches from Colorado Springs to Washington, from New York to
New Orleans, I found such a plethora of worthwhile data that two
volumes seemed advisable. As I proceeded with the second volume, I
realized that for an adequate portrait of Jefferson Davis and his times
I needed three volumes. In this decision I had the moral backing of
three experts in their fields: Dr. Allan Nevins, Mr. Bruce Catton,
and the late Professor Frank Owsley. So I end this present volume
in January, 1864. The third volume will take Jefferson Davis through
the last fifteen months of the war and to his death in 1889.
As Mr. Catton frankly adds "The Story of the Union Side of the
Civil War" to his title This Hallowed Ground, I present the struggle
for Southern independence from the South's point of view.
In 1860, Horace Greeley wrote of Jefferson Davis as belonging
"to a higher grade of public men." The Confederate President could
never be swerved from the theme that conscience and moral law
should govern all his political decisions. Once, in the United States
Senate he had said impulsively, "What my heart tells me is right,
nothing can prevail upon me not to do." Not the weight of the entire
body politic could cause him to go against his honest conviction.
Good sense, however, was fundamental in Davis's make-up. This
good sense revealed itself in his judgment, his taste, and in a rare
acumen in practical affairs. Yet this good sense was interwoven with
an extraordinary sensitivity, which held within itself the defects of its
quality. His faults most often stressed are "pride" and "over-sensi-
tivity." His pride was of a kind that belonged to heroes of Greek
tragedy; Greeley wrote understandingly that Davis's "occasional un-
intentional arrogance revealed his consciousness of great commanding
power." His sensitivity had its counterpart in his deep humanity his
compassion for all sufferings of the body and distresses of the mind.
At times he was suffused with an unnamable sorrow, something beyond
that caused by events, tragic or shoddy.
While he lacked the ruthlessness that generally dominates revolu-
tionary leaders, Davis possessed real military gifts and had a remark-
able insight into problems of strategy. General Lee told Burton
Harrison that Davis was "the best military adviser he had ever
consulted."
Strangely, one of the most persistent misconceptions about Jefferson
Davis is his "coldness/' which has been reiterated in countless mono-
XIV INTRODUCTION
graphs and tomes. Though he sometimes seemed to be distant and self-
enclosed, he was really the warmest of men and such a friend as any-
one would be fortunate to encounter in a lifelong search.
It is surprising to discover how many prominent men, by their own
written testimony, "loved him as they never loved another man on
earth." The burly Texan John Reagan wrote thus after fifty years in
national public life. L. Q. C. Lamar, who became a Justice of the
United States Supreme Court, declared, "I love and honor our Chief
above all men." Not only scores of Southerners, but numerous North-
erners, like General George W. Jones of Iowa, expressed their devotion
to the man Jefferson Davis in unabashed superlatives.
Born with a temperament distinctly aristocratic, despite his modest
origin, Jefferson Davis was the kind of aristocrat the common man
intuitively likes and trusts. He had the charm to attract and the gift
to give courage to the discouraged. The North admitted his "power to
stimulate a mood for high deeds."
Believing with Heraclitus that "wisdom consists of saying what is
true," Davis faced his fellow men of every kind with "the same look
of dignified respect and sincerity, without a suggestion of premedi-
tated caution." But he could detect sham quickly, and it was difficult
for him to conceal his contempt for it. While courteous, he could
not make himself charming to men in whom he detected dishonesty or
hypocrisy. Self -seeking persons felt his silent disapproval; they hated
him for making them esteem themselves less, and longed for his fall.
What has struck me perhaps more forcibly than anything else in my
delving into facts is the struggle Davis had with difficult personal-
ities among his compatriots. Dealing with certain ambitious, mali-
cious, or misguided Southerners, both civil and military, consumed as
much of his vital energy as fighting off the invading battalions from
the North.
Though Davis lacked a certain political fluidity, he was aware that
planned action needs constant modification. A firm adherent of the
Constitution and State Rights, he believed in adjustment to changing
circumstance. As he wrote Governor Zebulon Vance of North Carolina
on July 14, 1863, "The officers of this Government have always been
instructed to insist upon a rigid construction of the laws only where it
appeared necessary."
Patience was not a quality inherent in Jefferson Davis; it came
fern years of cultivating self-control. When in pain, he was sometimes
irapatient, and, on occasions, irritable. His intense "holding in," how-
INTRODUCTION XV
ever, could bring on agonizing neuralgic attacks. When in such dis-
comfort from inflamed nerves that he could hardly sit still during
an interview, he strove to preserve an inner calm that gave him sur-
passing power and strength.
Davis was not ambitious in the accepted sense of the word. He felt
no necessity to extend his ego. In the political arena he had had almost
every high office thrust upon him. He accepted the appointment as
Secretary of War by Franklin Pierce with great reluctance. When he
left the United States Senate in January, 1861, he had earned a repu-
tation unsurpassed by any contemporary then alive (Webster, Clay,
and Calhoun were dead). Davis certainly did not covet the Presidency
of the Confederacy. He took it only because the South, demanding
a man of vision and force whom it could trust, would have no one
else. As he ascended this new eminence to fame, he frankly prayed
for the support and guidance of a higher power.
Except for the ineffable consolation of a clear conscience, Jefferson
Davis was not to breathe freely for years to come. Beyond three days
of recuperation at an anonymous farm near Richmond in the late
summer of 1861, the President took no vacation during the war. And
never for one day was there a cessation of the stupendous problems
he had to face, nor the pestering daily annoyances of human experi-
ence. It is remarkable how he could walk in and out of the crashing
discords of the hour, and, through them all, maintain his spiritual
integrity.
As President of the Confederacy, Davis was continually torn be-
tween military and political needs. It was impossible for him to con-
centrate the armies as much as he desired, for each state was fervently
intent on protecting itself. Few could see, as he could, their country
as a whole. The average Southerner saw his state or his district; he
rarely pictured necessities several hundred miles from home. In almost
every phase of essential civil activity, as well as of war-making, there
was a glaring want of manpower in the Confederacy. As one soldier
complained, "The plagued Yankees have such an ability and habit
of outnumbering us."
In considering Jefferson Davis's abilities almost a century after
the War for Southern Independence, it might be remembered that
George Washington assumed his Presidential duties when his vic-
torious little nation was at peace and he himself the land's supreme
hero. Yet the Father of His Country was subjected to such vicious
attacks that he cried out, "I would rather be in my grave than m
XVI INTRODUCTION
the Presidency.' 7 To Thomas Jefferson, he wrote: "Every act of my
administration is tortured in such exaggerated and indecent terms as
could scarcely be applied to Nero, to a notorious defaulter, or to a
common pickpocket."
Abraham Lincoln inherited a government that had enjoyed estab-
lished order for fourscore years and that possessed four times the
white population of the Confederacy, together with an army, a navy,
a merchant marine, arsenals, and manufactories representing an esti-
mated fifty to one hundred times the industrial power of the South.
It was far easier to be chief executive of a powerful country with a
flag respected around the globe than to create a brand-new nation with
few resources except cotton and courage.
When Jefferson Davis became President of the Confederacy, the
infant republic had an appalling lack of arms and equipment, "not
a powder mill, not a ship or a shipyard." In a paper read before the
Massachusetts Historical Society in February, 1924, General Morris
Schaff declared, "How he met this helpless chaotic state of affairs
is a matter of history and the wonder of the world." "The armies
he put in the field," the Union veteran said, "the great odds they had
to meet and the victories they won, the four years he held the South
loyal to its Cause amid the sorest trials, tell the story of his sagacity,
energy, and inspiring, indomitable will."
While it is no part of this work to present a contrasting study of
the character of Mr. Lincoln, as the chief antagonist on the Northern
side, I touch upon him as Mr. Davis thought of him and read about
him in the foreign press. To give weight to the impressions, I quote
from Northern authorities such as the noted historian James Ford
Rhodes and Lincoln's scholarly biographer Professor J. G. Randall,
and from diarists like Gideon Welles, his Secretary of the Navy. In
his assumption of a dictatorial role, I am aware that Mr. Lincoln be-
lieved the end justified the means that at all cost the Union should
be saved. In presenting the Southern point of view, I am not unmindful
of the Northern feeling that the Union was everlasting because of
changes in opinion that time had brought, even though on a historical,
constitutional basis, the South was more accurate in interpretation.
That the War for Southern Independence was merely a struggle of
the rich planters to keep their slaves is believed by few thinking
persons today. In 1863, a British observer, Lieutenant Colonel Fre-
mantle of the Coldstream Guards, discovered that "the natives [the
poor farmers] were red-hot in favor of fighting for their independence
INTRODUCTION XVU
to the last" When some uncomprehending Federal officer asked a
ragged Confederate prisoner, obviously no slaveowner, why on earth
he was fighting, the fellow looked him coolly in the eye and answered
for the South with devastating simplicity: "Because y'all are down
here."
As the war's centenary approaches, Southerners may need to be
reminded that one reason why they can take such pride in their heri-
tage is because Jefferson Davis was chosen President of the Confed-
eracy. Senator John Daniel of Virginia put the whole matter simply
when he said in 1890: "Had a man less sober-minded and less strong
than Davis been in his place, the Confederacy would not only have
gone down in material ruin it would have been buried in disgrace."
Like the Greeks, Davis regarded honorable defeat as only less glori-
ous than victory. To give up while there was the possibility of success
would not only have been treasonous, but would have ended the
struggle without honor. After her husband's death, Varina Davis wrote
hopefully in her Memoir: "Posterity is the just and generous judge
to whom Confederates look to write his honored name high on the
shining lists of brave, self-sacrificing heroes."
When Colonel Crafts J. Wright, an admiring Union officer, was
vigorously attempting to correct falsifications about the former Presi-
dent, Mr. Davis wrote him in 1877: "Truth is eternal, but as you
indicate, it requires advocates and defenders." Since Robert E. Lee,
the Confederate soldier, has been accepted as a national hero, one can
hope that by the war centenary's end in 1965 all Americans may
come to appreciate the true caliber of Jefferson Davis, the President.
As John Keats declared, "A Man ought to have the Fame he
deserves."
HUDSON STRODE
Cherokee Road
Tuscaloosa, Alabama
May 30, 1959
Jefferson Davis: Confederate President
CHAPTER I
A NEW NATION IS MADE
AS WAR LOOMS
A SLENDER MAN with fair hair turning gray walked to a window
in his apartment in Montgomery's Exchange Hotel and glanced
thoughtfully down upon the iron fountain flecked with gilt in the ris-
ing sun. Women and boys, white and colored, were filling pails with
sparkling artesian water. In the early-morning light the figures made
variegated changing patterns, like a kaleidoscope, as they departed
by five different streets radiating, starlike, from the large open space
that was too lopsided to be called either a plaza or a square. The broad-
est of the streets led up along a gentle incline east to Alabama's white-
domed capitol set on green terraces, where just a fortnight ago the man
had been inaugurated President of the newborn Confederacy.
Now Jefferson Davis had had only fourteen days in which to get a
brand-new nation functioning before Abraham Lincoln was sworn in
as President of the United States. He had been under a ceaseless strain
of decisions, each more or less final in itself. With teeming problems
pressing upon his brain, he had not slept well. On this fourth day of
March, 1861, he was particularly concerned with what Mr. Lincoln
would say in regard to peace or war between the North and the South.
Since Lincoln's election in November, Jefferson Davis, and the world
as well, had been waiting for some pronouncement from the President-
elect. Except to possibly a few close political friends, Lincoln had re-
mained noncommittal in Springfield, giving out nothing to the press.
His silence had raised great expectations of some profound pronounce-
ments as soon as he started his tour to Washington. By coincidence,
each man began his famous trip into history on February n, the day
3
4 JEFFERSON DAVIS
after Davis received news that the Confederacy's chief office had been
thrust upon him and the day before Lincoln's fifty-second birthday.
In the hope of divining Lincoln's intent, Davis had followed,
through the papers, his rival's progress and had carefully noted reports
of his speeches. But from his speech in Cincinnati on February 12
until his arrival in Washington, the President-elect had said nothing
one could hold to with any assurance. "The crisis," Lincoln declared
pleasantly, "is all artificial. 7 ' He enjoined his countrymen to keep
cool, because nothing was going wrong. North and South would have
to wait for the inaugural address to know if one ever could know
what Mr. Lincoln really had in mind.
Davis was in almost total ignorance of the character of the Illinoisan.
He read in the papers and heard people continually referring to the
contrast between his own arrival to cheering crowds in Montgomery
and Lincoln's stealthy entrance into Washington with only two heavily
armed companions. According to all accounts, because Maryland was
seething with secessionist sentiment the President-elect had been per-
suaded to make a secret journey from Harrisburg to Washington. Ru-
mors had circulated that Lincoln would be assassinated as he passed
through Baltimore from one railway station to the other. It had also
been whispered that his special train would be derailed and hurtled
down an embankment, where "a Baltimore barber and his gang" would
finish him off. Old General Winfield Scott, greatly excited, had sent
word to William H. Seward, who was to be Secretary of State, that
Lincoln must change his travel schedule.
Lincoln placed his safety and his movements in the hands of
a former Scottish barrelmaker named E. J. Allen, who, as Allan
Pinkerton, was now a detective. Leaving his wife and official party in
Harrisburg, Lincoln was whisked back by way of Philadelphia in a
single-coach train, in which he and Ward Lamon, his law associate
in Springfield, were the only passengers. In Philadelphia they were
met by Pinkerton and driven across town to the P.W.&B. station. In
the shadowy night, according to the friendly New York Times, the
President-elect, disguised in a Scotch plaid cap, a bunchy muffler, and a
very long military cloak, 1 was put aboard the sleeping car in the guise
of an invalid.
Around six o'clock, when the train huffed into the Washington sta-
tion, the conductor was surprised to see the rangy sick man, now re-
1 The Scotch cap was later discredited as an invention of the reporter, but the incognito
was never denied.
A NEW NATION IS MADE AS WAR LOOMS 5
markably recovered, descend the car steps in "a slouch hat, a shawl,
and a short overcoat." He walked off into the waiting room between
his two wary-eyed protectors, Lamon and Pinkerton, whose coats
bulged with concealed weapons.
Only one person, Senator Elihu Washburn of Illinois, was at the
station to meet the incoming President of the United States. Appar-
ently no one else in the station recognized the man who was to be ac-
claimed one of history's greats.
At Willard's Hotel, Senator Seward, who had barely missed being
President himself, waited to welcome him. After a speculating glance,
with perhaps a spicule of malice at his successful rival's embarrass-
ment, he suavely felicitated Mr. Lincoln on his safe journey through
disaffected Maryland.
To Davis, Lincoln's furtive entrance into Washington seemed as
unnecessary as it must have been embarrassing. He had completely
discounted rumors of any attempt in Baltimore to assassinate the Re-
publican President, despite the threats. But the behavior of Mary-
landers the next afternoon, when the Presidential train did arrive
like Hamlet without Hamlet made Davis hopeful that Maryland
would soon join the Confederacy. The papers carried exciting stories,
and Howell Cobb, President of the Provisional Congress, showed Da-
vis a letter from I. K. Bowen stating that an estimated 10,000 persons
were at the Baltimore station "to show their colors." "The moment the
train arrived," he wrote, "supposing Lincoln was aboard, the most ter-
rific cheers ever heard were sent up, three for the Southern Confeder-
acy, three for 'gallant Jeff Davis,' and three groans for 'The Rail
Splitter.' " "Had Lincoln been there," Bowen declared, "contrary to
my preconceived opinions, he would have met with trouble."
During the interval between Mr. Lincoln's arrival at Washington
and this fourth of March, when he would leave his hotel in a carriage
with James Buchanan to be sworn in as President, Davis had often
wished he could penetrate the enigma of this odd-looking man from
Illinois, who had been born only a hundred miles from his own birth-
place in Kentucky and some eight months later. He felt that, in a large
measure, out of the convolutions of that one brain the destinies of both
the Union and the Confederacy would be given direction. But Davis
heard that Seward confidently expected to rule. And according to all
the information he had received, Seward was now believing that the
only possible policy was appeasement. The new Secretary of State
was said to regret bitterly his famous "irrepressible conflict" phrase
6 JEFFERSON DAVIS
and to be willing to do everything in his might to nullify his own
prediction. The London Times spoke of him as one whom "the convul-
sions of the country have terrified into moderation . . . terrified by
the complete fulfilment of his own prophecy." Davis pondered the sig-
nificant question: How powerful would Seward be in the new Adminis-
tration?
In the weekend that preceded this Monday, March 4, a grim ten-
sion was evidenced throughout the South, in the Confederate Congress,
in the hotel lobbies, and at women's gatherings. What would Mr. Lin-
coln's inaugural address bode? On Sunday the tenseness was felt even
in the churches, where men and women made their private prayers for
peace. President Davis had attended service at St. John's Episcopal
Church, occupying the pew that had been specially marked for his
family's use. The people who saw him took courage from his outward
serenity. In his eyes there was an expression of fearless candor. Even
the wiliest of churchgoing politicians might discern something incor-
ruptible in him, a quality that could not be assailed or circumvented.
That Sunday night, on the eve of Lincoln's inauguration, while the
Confederate capital, Montgomery, remained in suspenseful waiting,
Washington was astir. Wild rumors echoing Baltimore circulated.
Many men had sent their women and children from the city that after-
noon to avoid no one knew what. All night, orderlies dashed about;
"guard details were marching to all points of danger." Because of a
whisper that the Capitol would be blown up, police searched in "sewers
and secret places" for explosives. There was undoubted resentment to
Mr. Lincoln's being inaugurated, as numerous prominent Southerners
still in the United States capital reported. A private wire had been
rigged to bring news from Washington directly to the Confederate
Executive Offices in the plain brick building diagonally across the
square from President Davis's hotel suite.
The fourth of March dawned clear in Washington, as it did in Mont-
gomery; but up North the day turned bleak and disagreeable, with a
blustery wind.
As telegraphic items were received, the apprehension Davis felt
over the regime of a sectional Chief Executive, elected by a political
party that made little secret of its active enmity to the South, was not
mitigated by accounts of Lincoln's unprecedented "military" inaugu-
ration. In Washington, armed troops were "ostentatiously thrust every-
where upon the public attention." On roof tops along Pennsylvania
A NEW NATION IS MADE AS WAR LOOMS 7
Avenue squads of sharpshooters were half concealed. A Northern gen-
tleman, author of The Diary of a Public Man (reputedly Samuel Ward,
brother of Julia Ward Howe), later confessed that he never felt such
a sense of shame and mortification for his own country as he felt that
day "in entering the Capitol through hedges of Marines armed to the
teeth."
At a distance from the Capitol, old General Winfield Scott and older
General John C. Wool were stationed in command of their respective
flying batteries the batteries whose guns had roared through the
Mexican War and made possible the acquisition of California and the
Southwest, Several Southern observers commented on the coincidence
of those same cannon being set to protect Abraham Lincoln, who, dur-
ing his one term in Congress, had so fulminated against the war that an
indignant Illinois citizenry had refused to elect him to another term.
Virginia's Roger Pryor, who kept his seat in Congress until Mr.
Lincoln's inauguration, felt that "on that mournful day a shadow and
a fear hung over everything" and that no one was more oppressed by
the gloom than the President himself. Everyone, from outgoing Presi-
dent Buchanan to the armed guard, seemed ill at ease. "In his uncon-
trollable agitation," old Chief Justice Roger B. Taney, who had sworn
in eight former Presidents, now trembled at coming events and could
hardly enunciate.
Mr. Lincoln was "pale and obviously nervous"; some alarmist
friends had warned him that he might be shot while he spoke. The
committee on arrangements had not made things comfortable for
him; instead of a solid lectern, only a small rickety table had been
provided. When the rangy man rose to read his address and took off
his black stovepipe hat, there was not enough room for it on the table
top. His longtime political enemy Stephen A. Douglas, who had made
his way through the tight throng to the front row close beside the
President, solved the difficulty by reaching forward, taking the hat,
and accommodating it on his knees throughout the ceremony.
The crowd before the stand was not so large as had been expected.
Though well behaved, it manifested little enthusiasm. Mr. Lincoln's
midwestern voice, however, carried well above the wind, and he read
with feeling and earnestness. As the laid-by sheets of his address be-
gan to ruffle with the gusts, he used his gold-headed California cane
for a paperweight. All went quietly until suddenly a loud snap was fol-
lowed by a crash, with "something like a struggle on the ground. 3 ' Mr.
Lincoln looked up, startled, as was everyone else. But it was only a
8 JEFFERSON DAVIS
broken tree bough, on which a venturesome spectator had crawled
out too far and had sustained a hurtless tumble.
With keenest attention, Jefferson Davis studied the text of the in-
augural address when it carne in by special wire. He did not know that
when Mr. Lincoln had submitted to his chosen Secretary of State the
draft so carefully prepared in Springfield, Seward had urged him to
delete the two last sentences, which he considered "too warlike," and
then had suggested closing with "some words of affection ... of calm
and cheerful confidence." Lincoln had therefore scratched through the
lines "You can forbear the assault upon it [the United States Govern-
ment] ; I can not shrink from the defense of it. With you, and not
with me, is the solemn question of 'Shall it be peace, or a sword?' "
Davis did not suspect that it was his onetime friend Seward who wrote
the substitute famous last paragraph which, reworded by Lincoln,
read: "We are not enemies, but friends. . . . Though passion may
have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic
chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield, and patriot grave,
to every living heart and hearthstone, all over this broad land, will yet
swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will
be, by the better angels of our nature."
At one other point in his address, Lincoln attempted to soothe the
South: "I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with
the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have
no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so."
But he derided any constitutional right of secession. "I shall take
care," he declared, ". . . that the laws of the Union be faithfully exe-
cuted in all the States. . . . The power confided to me will be used to
hold ... the property and places belonging to the Government, and
to collect the duties and imposts; but beyond what may be necessary
for these objects, there will be no invasion."
The last clause stood out in Davis's mind italicized as a sinister
threat. Lincoln would not cause bloodshed if the Confederate States
would permit Federal troops to reoccupy the Southern forts and to
collect duties for the United States Treasury at customhouses in Con-
federate ports! Only two forts of importance to the South were still
occupied by Federal garrisons: Sumter at Charleston and Pickens at
Pensacola. For several weeks now, Federal tariffs had ceased to be
collected in the seceded States, though feeble attempts had been
made from ships stationed off Charleston Harbor. United States courts
po longer held session in the Cotton States. Of all the Federal institu-
A NEW NATION IS MADE AS WAR LOOMS Q
tions, only the Post Office still continued to function and do business
in its accustomed way.
Clear in Davis's memory were the often-quoted words Lincoln had
uttered with conviction in 1848: "Any people whatever have the right
to abolish the existing government, and form a new one that suits
them better. This is a most valuable, a sacred right.' 7 Apparently now
that he was in the top executive office, the new President had different
ideas about the rights of the governed to choose their government.
Louis Wigfall, South Carolina-born Senator from Texas, dashed off
a telegram to Governor Francis Pickens of South Carolina: "Inaugural
means war. . . . There is strong ground for belief that reinforcements
will be speedily sent [to Fort Sumter], Be vigilant." The warning was
relayed to Jefferson Davis.
When the Inaugural Ball was in progress in Washington that night,
with Democrat Stephen Douglas escorting Mrs. Lincoln, who wore a
bright blue gown, certain Southerners met in conference and sent a
telegram to Montgomery. "We all agreed that it was Lincoln's purpose
at once to attempt the collection of revenue, to enforce and hold
Sumter and Pickens, and to retake the other places. He is a man of
will and firmness. His cabinet will yield to him with alacrity." This
judgment on Lincoln's character, which Davis remarked with sharp
interest, was penetratingly shrewd, because the vast majority in the
North seemed to believe that the new President would be managed by
his Cabinet and that policy would largely be dictated by the more ex-
perienced Seward.
In the days that immediately followed, Davis noted that the two
most important New York papers agreed on Lincoln's threat of coer-
cion. He was deeply disappointed that Horace Greeley had had such a
change of heart since his recent famous dictum that one section of the
nation could not be pinned to the other by bayonets. Lincoln had
sagely granted to the powerful Tribune the liberty to speak as the or-
gan of the new administration, and now Greeley admired Lincoln's
strength in threatening coercion, and declared the address was "right."
The New York Herald agreed on the coercive threat, but it did not
admire the speech. It affirmed, however, "the inaugural is not a crude
performance it abounds in traits of craft and cunning." The editor
professed to discern "marks of indecision, and yet of strong coercive
proclivities."
In the local Montgomery Daily Advertiser, President Davis read
that its Washington correspondent found the inauguration peculiarly
1O JEFFEKSON DAVIS
depressing. The Southern partisan noted "a lack of all manifestation
of applause/' 2 and claimed that "the anxious air of everyone, save the
Abolitionists, gave the whole affair more the mourning appearance of
a funeral than that of a joyful ceremonial."
In the same issue, Davis read a flattering editorial about himself:
"All military movements should be under the [Confederate] President,
and we are blessed by Providence with such a President that every
Southern soldier may freely trust his honor and his country's safety
in his hands. . . . Mr. Lincoln and the Tribune affect to believe that
we are not in earnest. Mr. Davis' force will convince them of the con-
trary, and then we will have peace. In preparedness for war lies our
safety, and we know, and the world will soon know, that the right man
is in the right place, and that with our Hero President at the head of
our Confederacy, we are invincible."
The Confederate President noted that the Border States, whose fu-
ture actions would affect the very crux of the matter, seemed be-
wildered as to Mr. Lincoln's meaning, but were darkly suspicious. The
Enquirer of Richmond, where the Virginia Convention was now in
session debating secession, spoke of "the cool, unimpassioned, delib-
erate language of the fanatic." "The question 'Where shall Virginia
go?' " it declared, "is answered by Mr. Lincoln. She must go to war"
The influential Baltimore Sun claimed that Lincoln's Inaugural "as-
sumes despotic authority, and intimates the design to exercise that
authority to any extent of war and bloodshed. If it means what it says,
it is the knell and requiem of the Union and the death of hope." From
Knoxville, in the pro-Union part of Tennessee, came a March 5 dis-
patch declaring: "President Lincoln's Inaugural is universally con-
demned, and, if reported correctly, will induce Tennessee to fight him
to the bitter end."
As Jefferson Davis perused newspaper opinions, he unhappily re-
flected that it was all coming about much as he had expected, and for
which dread exigency he had begun preparing immediately on taking
office. He saw that the confidence of his Secretary of War, Leroy
Pope Walker, who had jocosely agreed to wipe up with his handker-
chief all the blood spilled because of secession, was considerably
dashed. And Robert Barnwell Rhett's Mercury, which had insisted
that the North would never initiate coercion, now gravely announced:
"It is our wisest policy to accept the Inaugural as a declaration of
war."
'Carl Sandburg speaks of "a slight ripple of applause/'
A NEW NATION IS MADE AS WAR LOOMS 11
One significant bit of information that none of the papers knew
was that the very morning after the inauguration, before he had had
one peaceful day in office, President Lincoln had been handed a dis-
turbing dispatch from Major Robert Anderson. The commander of
Fort Sumter reported that the Confederates were preparing batteries
"to invest the fort" and that his food supplies were running out.
Though he had a good supply of salt meat, bread could last only
twenty-eight days, and other commodities, like beans, rice, and sugar,
from eight to forty days.
Without knowledge of the immediate crisis facing Lincoln, because
of the implied threats in his inaugural address, on Wednesday, March
6, the Confederate Congress took the precaution of authorizing Presi-
dent Davis, if necessary, to call out 100,000 volunteers to serve for
twelve months, "to repel invasion, maintain the rightful possession of
the Confederate States, and to secure public tranquility and independ-
ence against threatened assault."
T. C. De Leon was the first eyewitness to arrive from Washington
after Mr. Lincoln's inauguration, The young man, who had known
the Davises in the capital, had been asked by the Confederate Peace
Commissioners to carry to Mr. Davis "their report of the inauguration
and its effects."
Before presenting himself to the President, De Leon watched Mr.
Davis enter the Exchange dining room to take his evening meal.
He saw some of the more recent arrivals stare "with respectful curi-
osity" as the President moved to a place beside General Samuel
Cooper, whom he had made his army's Adjutant General when the
Northern-born West Pointer had resigned that same position in the
United States Army, "Absently, but not discourteously," Davis ac-
knowledged the general salutations and immediately began an absorb-
ing conversation with Cooper, "leaving his supper untouched."
De Leon finally sent a card over to announce his arrival with the
documents from the Peace Commissioners, whom the President had
sent to Washington to arrange an amiable separation. After supper,
Davis eagerly received him in his private parlor and began glancing
through the wordy report. But shortly he threw the pages aside and
began questioning the young man specifically. The Confederate Presi-
dent was interested in Mr. Lincoln's personal behavior; several times
he asked if he had showed uneasiness. De Leon poured out what he
had observed, and flavored his report with bits of Washington gossip.
12 JEFFERSON DAVIS
On the night of March 4, De Leon had attended a farewell dinner
at Wormley's with Wade Hampton, Jr., and some other Southern
blades. Dining in the next room was General Winfield Scott, and ac-
cording to "Jim," the popular mulatto waiter, the General looked "wor-
rit in his mind, not talking, just eating, but eating powerful." As
ticket holders drove through a depressing drizzle to the Inaugural
Ball, De Leon and his friends took a hack for the Aquia Creek mail
boat. When their vehicle passed a gaslit corner, the head of a U.S.
light battery, who was slowly trotting back to the arsenal, stopped
them. It was Lieutenant John Saunders, who had been "protecting"
the district about the Treasury. He wanted to bid De Leon farewell.
He avowed that in the day's "Peace Pageant" his cannon had really
been shotted with canister and that Lincoln's foot escort had had ball
cartridges in every musket. "Today settled it," he declared. "My resig-
nation goes in tonight. I shan't wait for Virginia. If I have to shoot at
Americans, I'll do it from the other side of the Potomac."
Davis listened with "eyes shaded by the lids"; then he would sud-
denly shoot at the young man "a gleam from the stone-gray pupil"
which might read his innermost thought.
De Leon noted how the President had changed in the brief time
since he had last seen him. He was slender almost to emaciation. "The
thin lips had a straighter line and a closer compression." However,
the eye, in which the sight had been lost some months previous,
scarcely showed the imperfection. In the other burned a deep steady
glow. "To all," De Leon commented, "his manner was unvarying in its
quiet courtesy, drawing out all one had to tell and indicating by brief
answer or criticism that he had extracted the pith from what was said."
Day by day, the President and the Provisional Congress con-
structed the machinery of government. Although throughout his politi-
ical career in Washington, Jefferson Davis had been known for his
unremitting labor, his energy as President astounded both his intimate
friends and the newspaper correspondents. While his official schedule
was from nine to five, he worked some fifteen hours of the day, either
at his office or in the Cabinet room, connected by a door always open.
He received huridreds of visitors, consulted with his Cabinet,
suggested revisions for bills, devised projects for the defense of the
broad Confederacy, and carried on a staggering amount of correspond-
ence. He was remarkably accessible; strangers saw him without
appointments. "It was the perfection of democratic simplicity," as
A NEW NATION IS MADE AS WAR LOOMS 13
H. J. Eckenrode has written, "an improvement of Jefferson himself."
When the President left his office, he generally carried back to the
Exchange a sheaf of papers. Later, when he was settled in the White
House, party-goers returning home long past midnight would see the
glow from his study lamp reflected on the garden's mock-orange hedge.
"It was wonderful," remarked De Leon, "to look on the frail body and
believe that it endured the terrible physical and mental strain he im-
posed upon it,"
Until March n, President Davis had managed without a private
secretary. Then he had selected Robert Joselyn, a Mississippian who
had served under him in the Mexican War. The papers spoke
of Joselyn as a "gay-hearted, prince-of-good-fellows sort, who wrote
poetry." Davis knew the importance of establishing pleasant relations
with the public, and he liked to have about him amiable personalities
who could meet the public with a smile.
On March n the Provisional Congress voted to accept the
permanent Confederate Constitution. It had been modeled closely
on that of the United States, and, as Davis said, the only changes were
those that experience had suggested "for better practical working or
greater perspicuity." The President's official term was fixed at
six years; he was not eligible for re-election. He was given full power
to remove his Cabinet officers and diplomatic agents. Protective tariff
duties and bounties were prohibited, though certain customs duties
were to be collected for revenue. In one capital innovation, the Presi-
dent was empowered to veto any individual appropriation in a bill
without vetoing the bill as a whole. Cabinet members, like English
ministers, might speak on the floor of Congress in favor of their own
reports and recommendations. Property in slaves, already existing,
was recognized and guaranteed, just as in the United States Constitu-
tion, and the right to own slaves in the common territories was pro-
tected. But further importation of Negroes from any foreign country,
other than slaveholding states in the Union, was absolutely prohibited.
And Congress reserved the right to prohibit the importation of slaves
from any state or territory not in the Confederacy.
Alexander Stephens had been one of the chief compilers of the docu-
ment. At this period, according to his best biographer, Rudolph von
Abele, the Vice-President was "on excellent terms with the President
and spent many hours closeted with him," though "he did not feel he
had an influential, directing part in things."
Altogether though not by Rhett, editor of the Charleston Mercury,
14 JEFFERSON DAVIS
and a few other extreme Southern radicals the Constitili
garded as "a model of wise, temperate and liberal statesmanship
dubitable intention was to perpetuate the fundamental principles o. _,
Constitution of the United States. The peace-desiring New York
Herald's judgment on the Confederate Constitution was very pleas-
ing to Davis: "The new Constitution is the Constitution of the United
States with various modifications and some very important and desir-
able improvements. We are free to say that the invaluable reforms
enumerated should be adopted by the United States with or without a
reunion of the seceded States, and as soon as possible. But why not
accept them with the propositions of the Confederate States on slavery
as a basis of reunion?"
On the evening of March n, the Alabama Convention in a body
called on the President. He received them in the public parlor of the
Exchange with Vice-President Stephens, members of the Cabinet,
and Alabama's Governor A. B. Moore. Judge W, M. Brooks, President
of the Convention, made a flattering little speech, and Davis "responded
eloquently," counseling firmness and "union among ourselves in de-
fense of the position we have assumed before the world," Davis's em-
phasis on "union among ourselves" was a foretaste of four years' plead-
ing with ambitious politicians and jealous generals to minimize per-
sonal interest for the good of the Confederacy.
Five days later, the three commissioners Davis had chosen to send
to Europe, Dudley Mann, Pierre Rost, and William Yancey, received
their instructions from Secretary of State Robert Toombs. They were
to make clear the absolute constitutional right of the South to with-
draw from the Union, and to emphasize the importance of trade with
the Confederacy. They were to hint that if war were permitted to be
launched against the Cotton States, the all-important commodity, cot-
to^ would -be cut off from British miUs. Because slavery might be a
stumbling block to recognition, since European repugnance to that in-
stitution was general, the commissioners were to touch the subject
fightly, and call special attention to the provision in the Confederate
Constitution that prohibited slave trade.
IB shading William Yancey, a radical proslavery advocate, to Eng-
land, many conservatives were of the opinion that the President had
blundered. The eloquent agitator, they said, was hardly the person to
impress Old World chancelleries. Though he had declined to be Attor-
ney General, Yancey's claim to some reward could not be ignored, and
he was, moreover, able, impressive-looking, and very persuasive.
A NEW NATION IS MADE AS WAR LOOMS 1$
As chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, Robert Rhett had
advocated a guarantee of twenty years of free trade as an exchange for
recognition. To be freed from Northern domination, Rhett was willing
to mortgage the South to Europe for twenty years. Perhaps Rhett's
idea was good. But to Davis such a promise smacked of economic vas-
salage. Like a majority of Congressmen, he favored a very moderate
tariff for purposes of needful revenue. Besides, Davis anticipated
eventual establishment of all sorts of manufactories in the South,
which he had been urging, unheeded, for a decade. If the all-important
question of sovereignty recognition could be settled first, the President
felt there would be little difficulty in agreeing on commercial treaties.
At the last hour, Rhett advised Yancey to resign from the diplomatic
mission, because his power to treat was curtailed. Though Yancey did
not resign, he departed in uncertain temper, carrying a handsome gold-
headed cane, which admiring Montgomery ladies had presented to him,
along with a bouquet of camellias.
For all his inspiring words, which stirred the Southern people to
patriotic devotion and confidence, the President knew that early rec-
ognition by England and France was of prime importance to his suc-
cess in building a nation. George Washington had had the great good
fortune to receive the flaming support of the young democratic idealist
Lafayette, who persuaded France to back his personal intervention.
And the Colonies had had abroad a brilliant emissary in that homely
prince of ambassadors Benjamin Franklin. Without France's timely
intervention, the American Revolution would most probably have
collapsed, in which case George Washington would not have immortal
fame as the savior-father of his country.
Davis, who admired British culture, understood that the majority
of the English were sympathetic with the Anglo-Saxon South rather
thai* with the North, now infiltrated with many breeds of Continental
emigrants. England was drawn to the South by some similarity of tem-
perament, particularly in the resemblances to her own squirearchy,
ao*d she rejoiced for economic reasons in the Confederacy's leaning to
free trade. Davis knew from history, however, that Her Majesty's
Government was never moved by mere quixotic impulses, but was im-
pelled largely by material and political motives. He did not believe
that Britain would actually intervene to the point of armed assistance.
But recognition of the Confederate States he did expect, and he hoped
for it very soon.
Ift the game of diplomacy with England, Davis was aware tbat the
l6 JEFFERSON DAVIS
South held something that looked like an ace of trumps: raw cotton.
The largest industry of the world's leading industrial nation was textile
manufacture, and England got from the South approximately 80 per
cent of her cotton supply. In 1860, her cotton business amounted to
some 80,000,000; an estimated 4,500,000 people were dependent on
the industry.
In January, 1861, De Bow's Review had declared that England was
convinced she would be ruined if the South's cotton could not reach
her. For almost a decade the idea had been waxing that cotton plant-
ing put the South in a commanding position. The famous slogan "Cot-
ton is King" had originated in 1855, when David Christy, living in
Cincinnati, published a little book called Cotton Is King; or Slavery
in the Light of Political Economy. The phrase caught the imagination
of Southerners and was repeated everywhere until finally it approached
an incantation that produced a kind of hypnosis.
In the Senate in 1858, Davis had heard Senator James A. Hammond
of South Carolina defy the North to make war on cotton, alias the
South. "Without faring a gun," Hammond declared, "should they
make war on us we could bring the whole world to our feet." "What
would happen," he asked, "if the South refused to plant cotton for
three years? England would topple headlong and carry the whole civi-
lized world with her, save the South. No, you dare not make war on
cotton. Cotton is king!"
The British economists themselves, in articles and charts, helped
to fix in the minds of politicians and planters a belief in the sovereign
power of cotton. The Northern mills, too, were dependent on South-
ern cotton, consuming in 1860 some 360,000,000 pounds, about a
fourth that used in British industry. 3
Though Jefferson Davis himself was never committed to an all-out
advocacy of the King Cotton theory, he had a mass of evidence to
make him believe in cotton as a mighty factor in foreign diplomacy.
In the spring of 1861 "the belief in the power of cotton to force Euro-
pean intervention was almost universal." All Southern Governors sup-
ported the idea, as did most of the press, the majority of legislators,
"As Frank Owsley points out in his detailed King Cotton Diplomacy, Southern
leaders did not accept the King Cotton theory until they had carefully considered the
importance of cotton to England, France, and the Northern States. In 1859, he says,
the South's exports, of which cotton was overwhelmingly foremost, amounted to
$198,489,351, out of a total of $278,392,080 for the whole United States. The South
was thus responsible for the bulk of America's medium of international trade, though
the North profited through both intermediary wholesale trade and the lucrative shipping.
A NEW NATION IS MADE AS WAR LOOMS VJ
and the planters themselves. Davis's conservative good friends South
Carolina's Robert Barn well and R. M. T. Hunter, Virginia's leader in
Montgomery, both advocated keeping cotton at home, regardless of the
strength or lack of strength of any blockade the Federals might insti-
tute.
In truth, however, in February, 1861, comparatively few bales lay
in Southern warehouses ; most of the previous fall's crop had been dis-
posed of. Of the total 1860-61 crop officially reported at 3,849,000
bales, more than three million had already been sent abroad and to
the North. The new crop had not been planted. Besides, the South had
no ships of her own in which to transport cotton. England was not in-
clined to send her vessels to fetch the commodity; for currently her
factories had more than an adequate supply, and the price of cotton
cloth was in a slump.
At the first Cabinet meeting, according to Secretary of War Walker,
Attorney General Benjamin suggested shipping all available cotton to
England as a bank to be used in purchasing supplies and defense ma-
terials. But Walker himself was loudest in pooh-poohing the idea of
actual armed conflict. Had not Horace Greeley himself, the Abolitionist
and strong Unionist, denied the authority of the Federal Government
to coerce the States? By April, however, Benjamin had become a
champion of the King Cotton diplomacy and expressed himself in
strong terms to foreign correspondents and observers.
In his Memminger, Bishop Capers answered Joseph E. Johnston's
charge in 1874 that the financial policy of the Confederacy failed be-
cause of the Administration's lack of forethought. To Johnston's ab-
surd assertion that "it would have been easy" (from March to the
blockade of May) "to ship and convert into money four or five million
bales of cotton," Capers declared the General's accusation of admin-
istrative failure "resolves itself in a fleet of phantom ships loaded with
phantom cotton."
The subject of cotton was thoroughly discussed by the Cabinet.
Though doubting the full magic potentialities claimed for the white
gold, the President agreed with the decision of his Cabinet and the will
of the vast majority. Anyhow, the disposition of cotton was related to
the Department of Finance, and finance had never been a speciality of
Jefferson Davis. He would have to let the financial policy of his govern-
ment be largely directed by men more experienced in business than
himself.
Although he had desired Robert Toombs, a successful man of affairs,
l8 JEFFERSON DAVIS
for his Secretary of the Treasury, he had been persuaded to give the post
to Charleston's C. G. Memminger, who bore a high reputation as a
banker and whose integrity was unimpeachable. At first, though it
started with a bare cupboard, the Confederacy had little difficulty about
finances. In response to Memminger's call for an immediate first loan
of five million dollars, subscribers answered with bids of eight million,
all at par or above. The credit of the Confederate Government
was good, so strong, in fact, that treasury notes could be exchanged
for gold; no serious decline was to occur until December. Because the
Provisional Congress was not inclined to vote a special defense tax,
Memminger later had to resort to the expediency of fiat money, which
simply meant that paper currency was made legal tender by fiat or law.
It was not backed by gold or silver, and not necessarily redeemable
in the coin of the realm.
The fiat method of raising funds was a rather surprising one com-
ing from Memminger, who was a most conservative banker. But if the
Confederacy were recognized by England and France, as President
Davis expected, the paper accepted in faith would be good. If the Con-
federacy had secured her independence, the fiat expediency would have
succeeded.
The President had daily informal conferences with one or two of his
Cabinet members as well as regular meetings. In three of his
Cabinet, Davis felt confidence: Judah P. Benjamin, the Attorney Gen-
eral, later Secretary of War and of State; Stephen R. Mallory, the
Secretary of the Navy; John H. Reagan, the Postmaster General.
Benjamin's subtle brilliance was founded on solid knowledge and cul-
tivated scholarship. Mallory, who had been chairman of the Committee
on Naval Affairs in the United States Senate, knew as much about
ships as any man in the South. Reagan, the hulking Texan, who re-
minded some of an ox-team driver, was unswervingly loyal to the Presi-
dent, though they often disagreed. These three were to remain in the
Cabinet until the dissolution of the Confederacy in 1865.
Memminger, the successful Charleston banker, Davis respected,
though he could never feel close to him. As the first Secretary of State,
Robert Toombs chafed over having little to do while waiting to hear
from the Confederate Commission in Europe. The ways and manners
of Toombs were somewhat too flamboyant and imperious for Davis;
and now people were saying that Bob Toombs would never get over
not being chosen President. Davis liked the willing Leroy Pope
A NEW NATION IS MADE AS WAR LOOMS 1Q
Walker, whom the Alabamians Yancey and Clement Clay had urged
upon him, but he was not adequate for the position of Secretary of War.
So, with his broad military knowledge, the President, as Commander
in Chief, would form the military policy. And, as William E. Dodd has
written, "the President very properly threw himself into the details
of the War Department as completely as if he himself had been the
Secretary of it." Though telegrams and important orders for supplies
or reinforcements and troop movements would pass through his hands,
Davis was tactfully careful that orders were sent out in Walker's
name.
While Jefferson Davis was driving with all his powers at establish-
ing a new nation, he and his wife were living in two rooms in the noisy,
crowded Exchange Hotel. The three children had been left temporarily
with Mrs. Davis's mother in New Orleans.
From a sprawling town of 8,000, Montgomery's population had
swelled to twice that number in a fortnight. Besides politicians seek-
ing sinecures, it held a goodly proportion of the Cotton States' fore-
most politicians, as well as officers recently resigned from the United
States Army, and eager youths bent on enlisting. Accommodations
were extremely hard to obtain. The smaller hostelries, as well as the
Exchange, were jam-packed. Even the meanest boardinghouses were
doing more than capacity business. Many of the leading families were
taking hand-picked paying guests. A few first-rate boardinghouses,
like Mrs. Cleveland's, catered only to gentlemen who had been dis-
tinguished in Washington: Vice-President Alexander Stephens, At-
torney General Judah P. Benjamin, and Secretary of State Robert
Toombs gave her patronage.
Though the President was forced to decline almost all social invita-
tions because of the pressure of work, his Cabinet officers and certain
members of the Provisional Congress were wined and dined by Mont-
gomery's fifty best families. Davis would take an occasional hour off
in the late afternoon to ride horseback about the pleasant riverside
town set in groves of oak, hickory, pine, and magnolia.
Jefferson Davis, who never cared greatly for cities, found the little
Confederate capital quite agreeable. Strategically located on the broad
Alabama River that flowed to the Gulf, the town, incorporated in 1819,
was in 1861 one of the most affluent cotton centers of the deep South.
After Andrew Jackson had won the decisive victory over the Creek In-
dians at Horseshoe Bend in 1814, well-to-do young planters from Vir-
ginia and the Carolinas had come into Alabama, bringing with them
2O JEFFERSON DAVIS
cultural amenities, as well as slaves. Many had settled in Mont-
gomery County, which lay in the center of the Black Belt, that irregu-
lar band of rich black soil, about a hundred miles in width, stretching
from the Atlantic to the Mississippi River. As quality attracts quality,
high-toned South Carolinians and Virginians, who came in the '4o's
and 'SQ'S, found many of their kind already settled in the county.
Planters had built tall white town houses, and many of their sons
had become well to do from law practice, banking, and commerce.
Though the general tone of society was provincial, ingrained family
tradition and pride in good living were obvious. Davis had hoped
that the executive mansion that had been chosen would suit his wife,
who had so relished diplomatic society in Washington. While the place
was not even faintly comparable to the White House in Washington, it
was, as Mrs. Davis deemed it, "a gentleman's residence." Con-
veniently located at the corner of Bibb and Lee Streets, 4 it was only a
short walk from the Exchange Hotel and the Executive Offices. It was
a large two-story white house with green shutters. An ornamental white
iron fence surrounded a small green lawn. On the ground floor, two
parlors and a spacious dining room were on the left of the reception
hall; the three rooms on the right included a library and two master
bedrooms. Behind the dining room, Varina Davis was pleased to find
commodious serving pantries for large-scale entertaining. Beyond
the detached kitchen lay a vegetable garden and extensive stables,
which would stall the mounts used by various Cabinet members, as
well as Mr. Davis's saddle horse and Mrs. Davis's carriage horses.
Since the place was to be rented furnished at $5,000 a year the
President's lady made notes of the extras in the way of silver, china,
and linen she should fetch from Brierfield, the Davises' home in Mis-
sissippi, while the house was being redecorated.
The balmy weather of Jefferson Davis's inauguration day continued
into mid-March. Flowers bloomed in every Montgomery garden. The
ladies kept the Davis suite filled with fragrant narcissuses, Roman
hyacinths, and japonicas. In the hotel parlors, Mrs. Davis received
callers continually. Among the visitors were warm friends from Wash-
ington, like Mary Chesnut, whose husband, James Chesnut, Jr., recent
United States Senator from South Carolina, was now a special adviser
4 In 1920 the house was moved to Washington Street, across from the Capitol, and is
now a museum known as The First White House of the Confederacy, furnished with
many authentic Davis pieces and personal effects of the President.
A NEW NATION IS MADE AS WAR LOOMS 21
to the President. "She met me with open arms/ 7 Mrs. Chesnut wrote.
"We did not allude to anything by which we are surrounded. We
eschewed politics." But the hotel lobby, jammed night and day with
office seekers, was a pandemonium of gesticulating politicians.
With a statesman's skill, in a few short weeks Jefferson Davis, ac-
cording to an admiring editor, had "moulded the revolutionary party
into a model government." Both civil and military departments had
been set in operation with remarkable rapidity. The captured Federal
forts were put in order. Depots for medicines and soldier's clothing,
as well as ordnance, were established. The gilded youth of the aristoc-
racy were going cheerfully into volunteer ranks, side by side with
hillbillies, demonstrating that this was not a rich man's struggle, but
a stand for independence.
A traveler from Tennessee reported in Nashville that farmers were
acceding to the plea to reduce cotton acreage and plant cereals and
other foodstuffs. Planters made donations of provisions for encamp-
ments. Banks offered loans in large amounts. The presidents of all
Southern railroads came in convention to Montgomery and offered
Jefferson Davis the use of their lines for transporting troops at half-
fare, taking Confederate bonds in payment. Montgomery churches
were kept open every day; women from the town and the county gath-
ered in them to sew on rough uniforms, while their colored maids,
clustered on the porches or under shade trees, plied their needles at
the same tasks as their mistresses, pausing sometimes to drink a dip-
perful of iced lemonade or to note new units of recruits marching to
martial music.
At the end of March, harmony and enthusiastic good will seemed to
pervade the seven seceded states. A New Orleans paper reported that
a District of Davis, like the District of Columbia, would be created as
soon as the permanent Confederate capital was selected. In Charles-
ton, a purchased vessel, readied for defense, was rechristened the Lady
Davis in compliment to the President's wife. The people, De Leon
wrote, were perfectly content to think that the government was in the
hollow of Mr. Davis's hand.
Even from northern latitudes, Davis received scattered tokens of
esteem. The Bangor (Maine) Union excoriated its rival, the Wfag,
for urging that the official vote by which the trustees of Bowdoin Col-
lege had conferred an honorary degree on "traitor Jefferson Davis"
22 JEFFERSON DAVIS
should be expunged from the records. Championing the Confederate
President in ringing affirmatives on April 3, the indignant Union de-
clared:
No language can express the loathing that every brave and honourable
man must feel for those contemptible and sneaking cowards who could for a
moment entertain or recommend such an idea. . . . What more dastardly
act than to creep within the sacred precincts of a college to stab the character
of a man whose character is unblemished before the world.
Jefferson Davis a traitor 1 What statesman in the whole history of America
has lived a purer or more upright life than he? Apply to the survivors of
Buena Vista, and ask them is Jefferson Davis a traitor? . . .
Bowdoin College never more justly bestowed a degree than that conferred
upon him; and it will be a long day before her trustees will become so
bigoted, as to strike from their roll of honor the brightest name upon it.
The President was touched that he still had such admiring North-
ern friends. He recalled that summer of 1855 among the hospitable
people of Maine, where he and Varina had been "accepted" with
such heart-warming courtesy.
On the whole, one month after his own inauguration, Jefferson Davis
began to feel a bit more easy about the Lincoln Administration. With
keenly realistic eye, however, he saw ponderous difficulties before him.
But, he reflected, if war could be averted during Lincoln's term, then
the Confederacy was a fixed fact and might look to a future of worthy
achievement and renown. Most observers from Washington insisted
that Seward "was in the ascendancy" and that everyone thought him
"the friend of peace." Though from experience Davis knew that the
adroit Seward was not to be trusted too far, he believed that his former
friend would never favor warlike aggression.
The Confederate President was deeply gratified when the North's
Number One Democrat boldly took the stand for peace. On March 2$,
Stephen A. Douglas proposed in the Senate "withdrawal of the gar-
risons from all forts within the limit of the States which had seceded,
except those of remote Key West and Dry Tortugas, needful to the
United States for coali&g stations." He argued that Charleston was
entitled to Sumter and Pensacola to Fort Pickens, unless the Washing-
ton Government intended to reduce the seceding states to subjection.
"We cannot deny," he said, "that there is a Southern Confederacy de
facto, in existence, with its capital at Montgomery. We may regret it.
/ regret it most profoundly, but I cannot deny the truth of the fact,
painful and mortifying as it is. ... I proclaim boldly the policy of
A
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ivlAi/Jj
," list mm was,
i
ted of sjipatljfitu secession,
at I same tit lie virtual %
stat Lkok to rii a fratridt
CHAPTER II
VACILLATION AND DOUBLE-
DEALING JUGGLERY"
THE WARM SPRING of 1861 in Alabama had brought unprece-
dented early fruition. On March 21, the Montgomery Daily Mail
reported that Mrs. Janney had discovered the first ripe strawberry of
the season. Soon Mr. Davis was receiving boxes of the luscious berries,
which turned his thoughts to maturing fruits and vegetables at Brier-
field. There was little time for nostalgia, however, for trouble from an
unlikely source came almost simultaneously with the first strawberries.
The President was dismayed at the lack of political tact exhibited by
his Vice-President. In a rabble-rousing address at Savannah on March
20, Stephens had burst forth on the subject of Negro slavery, which
Davis had been careful not to mention in his Inaugural. Stephens said :
Many governments have been founded upon the principle of the subordi-
nation and serfdom of certain classes of the same race; such were, and are
in violation of the laws of nature. Our system commits no such violation of
nature's laws. With us, all of the white race, however high or low, rich or
poor, are equal in the eye of the law. Not so with the negro. Subordination is
Ms place. He, by nature, or by the curse against Cain, is fitted for that condi-
tion which he occupies in our system. . . . Our new government is founded
on the opposite idea of the equality of races. Its foundations are laid, its
corner-stone rests upon the great truth, that the negro is not equal to the white
man.
To Davis's amazement, Stephens bypassed the all-important con-
stitutional guarantee of State Rights and emphasized the institution of
slavery. Could anything, he wondered, have been more calculated to
damage the Confederate cause both in the North and abroad than his
Vice-President's unfortunate speech? Abolitionists instantly seized
24
"VACILLATION AND DOUBLE-DEALING JUGGLERY" 25
upon Stephens's sentiments with cries of outrage and began demand-
ing drastic measures by the Lincoln administration. Jefferson Davis's
efforts to promulgate the fact that State sovereignty was the paramount
issue of secession, which he devoutly believed to the end of his life,
were now discounted by Stephens's foolish and inopportune words.
Many Northern papers, which had been fairly quiescent about the
South's withdrawal, even accepting the fact, now turned a glare of bad
publicity on Stephens as spokesman for the whole region. Though calm
voices like that of England's Quarterly Review might point out the
absurdity of fixing the phrase of a single speaker expressing an individ-
ual view upon some millions of people, "the great majority of whom
had nothing to do with slavery," temperate words were lost in a whirl-
wind of condemnation. Alexander Stephens's ill-advised speech helped
launch the Sumter relief ships that were to start the war. But the Sa-
vannah harangue was by no means the worst trouble his Vice-Presi-
dent was to cause Jefferson Davis.
Stephens did not return to Montgomery from Savannah, but re-
tired to his plantation at Crawfordsville, Georgia, to await events or
the summons of the President. It had not occurred to Stephens that
he was being indiscreet. He had evidence galore, he felt, that numerous
Northerners believed as he did. For instance, William Tecumseh Sher-
man, West Pointer from Ohio, who had headed a boys' military school
in Louisiana, "thought slavery a necessary institution." In December
of 1859, when Abolitionist denunciations were rampant, Sherman
had declared, "I would not, if I could, abolish or modify slavery. " x
As a testimony of the good relations between the Negroes and the
white people in the South, President Davis was pleased to receive a
letter from a colored man written one week after Stephens's unfor-
tunate Savannah speech. Dated March 27, it came from Bowman
Seals, of Clayton, in Barbour County, a former slave who had been
emancipated for meritorious conduct. Under the Alabama Guardian
Act of 1853-54, he had chosen his former owner for his guardian.
To His Excellency the President of the Confederate States:
The undersigned, Bowman Seals, a free man of color, residing in the said
county begs to offer his services in whatever capacity that may be deemed of
most value in resisting the enemy now threatening to invade the country.
My guardian D. M. Seals, Esqr., of this place approves of this offer. . . .
I know enough of Yankees and of their treatment of the starving blacks
1 W. E. Woodward, in A New American History, points up the opinions of numerous
Federal officers regarding the Negro and slavery.
2,6 JEFFERSON DAVIS
among them to understand that their war upon the South is prompted by no
love of us, but only by envy and hatred, and by an intermeddling and
domineering spirit. And I know, too, that if they were to succeed, instead of
benefitting any race or individual here, they would only bring disorder and
ruin upon all. ... I am accustomed to the use of firearms and have been
regarded as a good marksman; am a practical mechanic, and ready and
willing to work or fight against enemies threatening with such evils the land
where I have been brought up and protected. ... I presume not to ask
any office or emolument, but only that your Excellency . . . shall assign
me some duty that may make me serviceable in its defense.
The President might have questioned the authenticity of such a
letter, since some of the phrasing seemed beyond a former slave's
capacity. Yet he had only to recall how well the Montgomery brothers,
slaves on his brother Joseph's plantation, expressed themselves in writ-
ing; one of them Joseph had trained from a teen-age boy to act as his
private secretary. And even if Mr. Seals had helped the colored man
with the letter, the sentiments expressed reflected the attitude of many
Southern Negroes toward "Yankees." 2
Stephens's Savannah speech was particularly disturbing to the
President, for he was already discouraged by the official reception of
the Peace Commissioners he had sent to Washington a few days after
his inauguration. While A. B. Roman, Martin J. Crawford, and John
Forsyth had been royally welcomed by what remained of fashionable
society, they had not been received by the Lincoln Administration.
Davis had fully expected Lincoln or Seward to be willing to discuss
matters in dispute "with dignity and honor" around a conference table.
But days passed, and the Commissioners were ignored, for Presi-
dent Lincoln took the position that the seceded states were not out of
the Union. Finally, through the mediation of Justice Samuel Nelson
and Justice John A. Campbell of the Supreme Court, the Secretary of
State said he was prepared to talk with the Confederate emissaries
"indirectly" through the Judges. So the Confederate President or-
dered that proper form and ceremony be waived and that they confer
with an intermediary. Seward was most courteous and reassuring. His
government had only peaceful intentions, he insisted; Fort Sumter
would certainly be evacuated.
"Whatever response the President made to Bowman Seals's offer of services has not
come to light, but the freedman's letter was printed in the Clayton (Alabama) Banner
of April 18, 1861, and quoted in a Master's thesis, The Free Negro in Alabama,
to i86i t by Lewy Dorman in 1916 at the University of Alabama.
VACILLATION AND DOUBLE-DEALING JUGGLERY 2/
On March 9, the National Republican had announced that the gar-
rison would be withdrawn from Fort Sumter. This information may
have been put out as a "feeler," for Lincoln made note that it "agitated
the Republicans to opposition." But the commissioners informed the
Montgomery Government that despite the views of the "stiff-backed"
new President, they found Northern public sentiment inclined strongly
to peace, even at the price of final separation.
Justice Nelson, a New Yorker, visited three Cabinet members
Seward, Salmon P. Chase, and Edward Bates to dissuade them from
adopting any policy of coercion. He had carefully examined the laws
of the United States, he said, and, after consulting Chief Justice
Taney, he had concluded that coercion could not be effected by the
Executive Department without very serious violations of the Consti-
tution and the United States statutes.
Justice Campbell, an Alabamian, asked the Secretary of State what
he should write President Davis about Sumter and Fort Pickens.
Seward authorized Campbell to say that before the letter reached Mr.
Davis he would learn that the order for the evacuation of Sumter had
been made. He said that no change would be made in the status of
Fort Pickens, which was already bound by an armistice arranged un-
der Buchanan. The assurance, which Campbell gave the commissioners
orally in Washington, was sent by mail to the Confederate President.
Having been promised by Seward that the Federal Government
would order the evacuation of Sumter within a few days after March
15, Davis had his Secretary of War forward the news to Brigadier
General P. G. T. Beauregard, whom he had put in charge of the coastal
defenses at Charleston. A West Point graduate, Beauregard had
served as an engineer on General Scott's staff during the war with Mex-
ico. Late in 1860, he had been appointed superintendent of the United
States Military Academy, but because he openly declared his inten-
tion of following Louisiana if she seceded, his transfer was ordered
five days after he assumed his duties. In January he had resigned from
the Federal Army; and, on February 10, he had promptly sent Davis
congratulations on his being chosen President, asking, at the same
time, for a commission in the Confederate Army. His brother-in-
law, John Slidell, and other prominent Louisiana politicians had
recommended him for a brigadier.
Six days after Davis's inauguration, Major Beauregard had arrived
in Montgomery, where he was warmly received by the President. De-
cidedly Latin in type, Beauregard was a handsome man, with olive
28 JEFFERSON DAVIS
complexion, black hair, and heavy-lidded eyes in which "intense fires
of ambition were banked. 73 His expression was both impassive and
keen. Exuding an air of uncommon self-confidence, Beauregard's
bearing had more than a soupgon of the imperious. Napoleon was his
idol.
In a conference that lasted far into the night, the President had
asked Beauregard to take command at Charleston and strengthen the
batteries surrounding Fort Sumter. The next morning he sent him a
commission of Brigadier General. In a glowing state of mind, Beaure-
gard had reached Charleston on March 3 and assumed command of the
volunteers in Charleston the day of Lincoln's inauguration.
Davis found Beauregard's reports of work progress good. But five
days after Seward's promise, when no evacuation had taken place,
Beauregard reported to Montgomery that instead of preparing to de-
part, Major Robert Anderson, his former instructor in artillery, ap-
peared to be strengthening Fort Sumter's defenses. Confronted with
this relayed intelligence, Judge Campbell again approached Seward,
whom he found "buoyant and sanguine in his reassurances." Seward
spoke with confidence of his ability to carry through his peaceful pol-
icy. And he promised that if Lincoln and his Cabinet should institute
any change in plan in regard to Sumter, Campbell and the commis-
soners would be straightway informed.
Naturally Davis could not fathom the secret courses in Washing-
ton, but he knew there was division of opinion, which apparently lay
strongly on the side of peace. According to his Secretary of the Navy,
Gideon Welles, Mr. Lincoln was at first averse to offensive measures
and desired to avoid them. He had asked General Scott to prepare a
statement about Fort Sumter. "Scott was decidedly opposed," wrote
Mr. Welles, "to any attempt to relieve Major Anderson. The Navy, he
was confident, could not do it, and an army of at least 20,000 men
would be necessary to effect it. We had no such army, and the govern-
ment could not collect and arm one before the garrison would starve."
But Montgomery Blair "warned the President that the abandon-
ment of Sumter would be justly considered by the people, by the
world, by history, as treason to the country." On the other hand, Mr.
Lincoln was aware that a repulsed attempt would bring ridicule on his
Administration similar to The Star of the West incident under Presi-
dent Buchanan. If he sent an expedition, it would have to be a strong
one.
VACILLATION AND DOUBLE-DEALING JUGGLERY 2Q
General Scott had already written out an order to Major Anderson,
which he hoped the President would let him send.
You will, after communicating your purpose to His Excellency, the
Governor of So. Carolina, engage suitable water transportation & peacefully
evacuate Fort Sumter . . . [and] with your entire command embark for
New York. 3
But Lincoln withheld the order. Dissatisfied with Scott's opinion,
he sent Gustavus Vasa Fox, a Massachusetts textile agent who had
formerly been a naval officer, at Fox's suggestion to Charleston to
judge the probability of successfully reinforcing Sumter.
On the pledge that he had come on pacific purposes, Fox was per-
mitted by Governor Pickens to visit the fortress on March 21. Presi-
dent Davis was duly informed. At Sumter, without taking Major An-
derson into his confidence, Fox made notes and secretly matured his
own plans of supplying and reinforcing the island. When he returned
to Washington, he enthusiastically expounded his scheme to Lincoln.
Fox was eager to lead the venture. The President sent him secretly to
New York to begin exploratory preparations for a relief expedition.
A few days after Fox's "pacific" visit, Davis learned from Governor
Pickens that Lincoln had also sent to Charleston, as his confidential
agent, his Springfield friend Ward Lamon. Lamon informed the Gover-
nor that he "had come to try to arrange for a removal of the garrison."
On March 25, Pickens let this second emissary go to Sumter, presum-
ably to tell Anderson to prepare for removal. On his return, Lamon
asked the Governor if a war vessel might remove the Federal troops.
Pickens replied that no war vessel could be permitted in the harbor on
any terms. Lamon then said he believed Major Anderson would prefer
an ordinary steamer. He hoped to return in a few days to remove the
garrison.
The two visits by Lincoln's personal emissaries and the word of his
Secretary of State seemed on the surface to evidence good intentions.
Yet Davis was disquieted by the delay in evacuating; fifteen days had
passed since Seward's original assurance that the troops would be
withdrawn.
Lamon reported to the disappointed President Lincoln that the sole
Union sympathizer in all of Charleston was old Judge James Louis
Petigru, who had insisted from the first that secession would lead to
The order may be found in The Lincoln Papers, edited by David Mearns (Vol. II,
p. 476), which were made public only in 1948,
3O JEFFERSON DAVIS
disaster. He also reported that Major Anderson strongly favored
evacuation. Of all the high-ups in Lincoln's immediate political family,
only the aggressive Montgomery Blair and the ambitious Gustavus Fox
seemed stanch advocates of holding and strengthening the Charleston
fort.
In Lincoln's first Cabinet poll, on March 16, both Secretary
of War Simon Cameron and Secretary of the Navy Welles joined Sew-
ard in advising against a relief expedition. Secretary of the Interior
Caleb B. Smith and Attorney General Bates also agreed that such a
move would be unwise. In his note, Seward wrote: "Suppose the ex-
pedition successful, we have then a garrison in Fort Sumter that can
defy assault for six months. What is it to do then? Is it to make war
by opening its batteries and attempting to demolish the defenses of the
Carolinians? ... I would not initiate war to regain a useless and un-
necessary position on the soil of the seceding States."
Welles asked in his memorandum: "By sending, or attempting to
send provisions into Sumter, will not war be precipitated? It may be
impossible to escape it under any course of policy that may be pursued,
but I am not prepared to advise a course that would provoke hostili-
ties." Chase gave half-hearted approbation to the idea, if the President
were sure it would not inaugurate civil war. "If," he wrote, "the at-
tempt will so inflame civil war as to involve an immediate necessity
for the enlistment of armies and the expenditure of millions, I cannot
advise it in the existing circumstances of the country and in the pres-
ent condition of the national finances." 4 Only the Postmaster Gen-
eral, Montgomery Blair, voted in an unequivocal affirmative. Such a
move, he avowed, would demonstrate firmness in the new administra-
tion.
After a state dinner on March 28, Lincoln asked his Cabinet to re-
main. He had just been advised by General Scott, he said, that Fort
Pickens should be evacuated as well as Sumter. Montgomery Blair
burst out in indignant denunciation. The President scheduled a Cab-
inet meeting for the next day. According to W. E. Smith, in Blair Fam-
ily, when old Francis P. Blair, Sr., called at the White House next day,
the President said he did not know whether or not he would withdraw
Anderson's garrison. The imperious Blair admonished him sternly,
*J. G. Randall, in The CivH War and Reconstruction, says that Chase was really in
favor of letting the lower states go in peace. In 1862, Chase wrote: "It is true that,
prior to the attack on Fort Sumter, I shared a quite general opinion that it would be
better to allow the seven States to try the experiment of a separate existence rather
than incur the evils of a bloody war."
VACILLATION AND DOUBLE-DEALING JUGGLERY 31
declaring that evacuation would be treason and would forfeit public
confidence. His son, Montgomery, went to the Cabinet meeting pre-
pared to hand in his resignation if Lincoln decided to abandon Sumter.
Again President Lincoln put the question of Fort Sumter to the Cab-
inet members. The answers, according to Dr. Randall, were "substan-
tially the same," except that Welles shifted his position and was will-
ing "to concur in the sending of provisions and reinforcements." Sew-
ard was still vehemently opposed.
Lincoln now had Blair, Welles, and (reservedly) Chase agreeing
with him on the plan he had discussed with Fox, which the Captain
was already implementing at the New York Navy Yard. Without ma-
jority Cabinet support, Mr. Lincoln made his decision, and penned
the fateful order that was to cause the most bitter tragedy the Ameri-
can people have ever suffered.
To the Secretary of the Navy he handed this directive: "I desire
that an expedition, to move by sea, be got ready to sail as early as the
6th of April next, the whole according to memorandum attached, and
that you cooperate with the Secretary of War for that object." The
memorandum designated specifically the warships Pocahontas and
Pawnee and a revenue cutter, and specified that three hundred sea-
men and two hundred other men should be gathered at New York with
all necessary equipment.
The South Carolinians were expecting a peaceful evacuation almost
immediately after Lamon's visit. Mrs. Caroline Oilman of Charleston
was so sure the crisis was over that she got a military pass to visit her
summer place on Sullivan's Island and took a gardener down to ar-
range her flower beds. But the Charleston Courier, dubious at the de-
lay, burst out: "It is time this game of procrastination and vacillation
and doubledealing jugglery were stopped."
On April i, Jefferson Davis observed that the Montgomery oaks
were budded; the dogwood was at the height of bloom, and the air
balmy with full-fledged spring. According to the Daily Advertiser, "a
lovely sunny week" followed. So it was, with nature; but rarely was a
calendar week more supercharged with tensions, in both Montgomery
and Washington.
On that same first day of April, in a fantastic attempt to forestall an
armed conflict, Secretary of State Seward laid an extraordinary docu-
ment on Mr. Lincoln's desk. It was entitled "Some Thoughts for a
President's Consideration." First, he chided the Chief Executive, who
32 JEFFERSON DAVIS
had declared that his "policy was to have no policy," for not making
some declaration of policy. "We are at the end of a month's administra-
tion/' Seward charged, "and yet without a policy, either domestic or
foreign," Then he complained that the need to meet "applications for
patronage" had taken precedence over "more grave matters." Once
more he urged the termination of the occupation of Fort Sumter. And
in a most radical proposal calculated to bring the seceded states back
into the Union, he suggested that Lincoln should convene Congress
and declare war against Spain or France "if satisfactory explanations
are not received" for their meddling in Mexico and Santo Domingo.
Seward felt that it was worth the drastic expedient of instigating a for-
eign war to unite the states and avoid "the irrepressible conflict" he
had regrettably prognosticated. The Secretary of State suggested
that if Lincoln would not direct a policy, he himself would not
be averse to assuming such responsibility.
Mr. Lincoln, politely but firmly, wrote his overbold Secretary that
whatever must be done, he himself must do it.
While Lincoln played a dilatory game concerning Fort Sumter, a
general rumor of unprecedented activities in the New York Navy Yard
was spreading. President Davis had his Secretary of War send in-
structions to General Beauregard to be prepared to meet a hostile
force at any hour.
Davis had been keenly following the debates in the Virginia Con-
vention, which was then considering secession. On April 4, to his sore
disappointment, sentiment was 89 to 45 not to withdraw. The moun-
tainous western counties were almost totally for the Union. But
happily for Davis and less happily for Lincoln, the convention re-
mained in session to await future events.
Those Virginia delegates in favor of Southern independence were
saddened, because they believed that without the Border States to
support it the Confederacy would be summarily crushed. Few, how-
ever, doubted that if hostilities actually began, Virginia would side
with the South. Some ardent Virginia secessionists determined to bring
"a popular pressure" on "the slow Montgomery government" to assault
Sumter without further delay.
Fearing that the Sumter expedition, which was about ready to set
forth, might cause Virginians to change their votes, President Lin-
coln conferred with Colonel John Baldwin, pro-Union leader of the
Virginia Convention. According to reported testimony, Lincoln made
a conditional suggestion to withdraw the Sumter garrison. "If you
VACILLATION AND DOUBLE-DEALING JUGGLERY 33
will go back to Richmond/' Lincoln is credited with saying, < f and get
the Union majority to adjourn and go home without passing the or-
dinance of secession ... I will take the responsibility of evacuating
Sumter. ... A State for a fort is no bad business." 5
In his own account of the interview, however, Baldwin wrote that
the President lamented the fact that the interview had come too late,
but refused to credit Baldwin's prediction: "I tell you before God and
man that if there is a gun fired at Sumter war is inevitable."
In that delightful first week of April, Jefferson Davis, burdened with
a terrible sense of responsibility, could not rest. His appetite was
gone, and Varina, who had returned to Brierfield, was not there to
tempt him with the few palatable dishes the hotel could prepare. Con-
tradictory rumors came thicker than telegrams.
On April 5, a Washington dispatch to the Montgomery Daily Mail
announced: "The frigate Powhatan goes to sea tomorrow morning,
fully equipped and provisioned, and will probably take three compa-
nies of troops. The impression at the Navy Yard is that Forts Sumter
and Pickens are both to be relieved"
As the patience of the frustrated peace commissioners ran out, Judge
Campbell wrote Seward a strong letter demanding to know whether
the assurances of evacuation so often given were well- or ill-founded.
On April 7, Seward answered in writing: "Faith as to Sumter fully
kept. Wait and see." When the message was relayed to Jefferson Davis,
he may have taken a modicum of hope from the cryptic words; but,
still distrusting Seward, he was wary.
The very next day, a mysterious, unsigned telegram arrived in
Charleston informing Governor Pickens that an immediate attempt
would be made to relieve Sumter. It was supposedly sent by a news-
paperman named James Harvey, 6 whom Seward was later to recom-
mend as Minister to Portugal. That same evening, Robert Chew of
the State Department called in person on Governor Pickens and read
to him and General Beauregard a message that he said came from
President Lincoln.
Pickens and Beauregard listened gravely as Chew read aloud the
brief notification: "I am directed by the President of the United States
5 The quotation appears in Annual Report, American Historical Association, 1915, p.
211. Baldwin's testimony of February 10, 1866, appears in House Reports, No. 30* of 39
Congress, first session.
a Harvey had sent previous telegrams to personal friends in Charleston assuring them
Sumter would be evacuated.
34 JEFFERSON DAVIS
to notify you to expect an attempt will be made to supply Fort Sumter
with provisions only; and that if such an attempt be not resisted, no
effort to throw in men, arms, or ammunition will be made, without
further notice, or in case of an attack upon the fort."
The full instructions to Chew, dated April 6, may be read in the
Official Records:
Sir You will proceed directly to Charleston, South Carolina; and if, on
your arrival there, the flag of the United States shall be flying over Fort
Sumter, and the fort shall not have been attacked, you will procure an
interview with Gov. Pickens and read him as follows: [Here was inserted
the exact message Chew read aloud.]
After you shall have read this to Governor Pickens, deliver him the copy
of it herein inclosed, and retain this letter yourself.
But if, on your arrival at Charleston, you shall ascertain that Fort Sumter
shall have been already evacuated, or surrendered, by the United States
force; or shall have been attacked by an opposing force, you will seek no
interview with Gov. Pickens, but return here forthwith.
Before Chew reached Charleston, the relief expedition was on its
way, and Seward's famous message, "Faith as to Sumter fully kept,"
had been relayed to the Confederate President. Did Mr. Seward half
expect that Sumter would already have been evacuated?
The arrival of the expedition might have been expected shortly after
the delivery of Lincoln's message, which would have given Beaure-
gard little opportunity to get instructions from the Confederate Gov-
ernment. But President Davis had already advised him to be on the
alert for a conflict, and his forces stood in readiness. In addition, be-
cause of cross-purposes within Lincoln's Cabinet, created by Seward's
manipulations, and due to a severe storm at sea, the arrival of the
Federal vessels was delayed.
As to the size of the so-called "relief" expedition, the historian James
Ford Rhodes wrote: "Fox had arranged that it should consist of the
war-ships Powhatan, Pawnee, Pocahontas, and Harriet Lane] the
steam-tugs, Uncle Ben, Yankee, and Freedom; and with the merchant
ship Baltic, with two hundred men and the necessary supplies on
board." It was altogether a formidable little armada that was to enter
Charleston Harbor. The total number of men and cannon has been
variously estimated, with figures running as high as two thousand men
and sixty-odd guns, but according to the Federals' own statement, the
relief expeditions consisted of "eight vessels, carrying twenty-six guns
and about fourteen hundred men."
CHAPTER III
AWESOME DECISIONS AND
SUMTER'S FALL
JEFFERSON DAVIS had reason for his conviction that the weight
of Northern civilian opinion was mightily opposed to any move on
Mr. Lincoln's part that would start a war. However, Martin Craw-
ford had telegraphed Confederate Secretary of State Toombs that in
the opinion of the Confederate Peace Commissioners Lincoln "did not
have the courage to give the order of evacuation," because it might
lose him popularity in the North. They believed that he was shifting
responsibility to Major Anderson "by suffering him to be starved out/'
Davis did not know that the Commander of Fort Sumter himself
earnestly urged the Washington Government not to instigate coercive
measures. Major Anderson had told Captain Fox that the fort could
not be successfully supplied; and Mr. Lincoln's personal agent, Ward
Lamon, had led Anderson to believe that the idea of "relief" had been
abandoned. But on April 7, a communication from the War Depart-
ment quite shattered Anderson's hope for peace. It was the first written
word he had had from the Lincoln Government since the inauguration
a month previous. General Scott had not been permitted to send his
order of withdrawal. Neither President Lincoln nor his Secretary of
War had written Anderson a line. He had been left in ignorance, and
deceived. Now Cameron informed him that the ships Were on the way.
"You will therefore hold out, if possible," he wrote, "till the arrival of
the expedition." Then came two buck-passing paragraphs:
It is not, however, the intention of the President to subject yotir command
to any danger or hardship beyond what, in your judgment, would be usual
36 JEFFERSON DAVIS
in military life; and he has entire confidence that you will act as becomes
a patriot and soldier, under all circumstances.
Whenever, if at all, in your judgment, to save yourself and command, a
capitulation becomes a necessity, you are authorized to make it.
The next day Major Anderson wrote a distressed letter to the Adju-
tant General, Colonel Lorenzo Thomas.
Colonel: ... I had the honor to receive, by yesterday's mail, the letter of
the honorable Secretary of War, dated April 4, and confess that what he
there states surprises me very greatly. ... I trust that this matter will be
at once put in a correct light, as a movement made now, when the South has
been erroneously informed that none such would be attempted, would produce
most disastrous results throughout our country.
It is, of course, now too late for me to give any advice in reference to the
proposed scheme of Captain Fox. I fear that its result can not fail to be
disastrous to all concerned. Even with his boat at our walls, the loss of life
(as I think I mentioned to Mr. Fox) in unloading her will more than pay
for the good to be accomplished by the expedition. . . .
We have not oil enough to keep a light in the lantern for one night. The
boats will have to, therefore, rely at night entirely upon other marks. I
ought to have been informed that this expedition was to come. Colonel
Lamon's remark convinced me that the idea, merely hinted at to me by
Captain Fox, would not be carried out.
We shall strive to do our duty, though I frankly say that my heart is not
in this war, which I see is to be thus commenced. That God will still avert it,
and cause us to resort to pacific means to maintain our rights, is my ardent
prayer. 1
Beauregard intercepted the dispatch and sent it to Jefferson Davis.
As the President read the manly, frank, and moving letter, he saw that
his old friend Bob Anderson was absolved from any suspicion of com-
plicity. Though the language was restrained, Anderson was obviously
shocked at the deceit which had been practiced on him, a Union offi-
cer, as well as on the Confederate Government. Anguish of soul was
revealed between the lines. The words "I frankly say that my heart is
not in this war, which I see is to be thus commenced" were of peculiar
significance. Robert Anderson placed the blame of starting the war
squarely on the Lincoln Administration.
On April 8, Beauregard received a useless, warning telegram from
Judge Crawford: "We were reassured yesterday that the status of
a The letter, which is recorded in Official Records, Series i, Vol. I, p. 294, has a
postscript from Anderson asking Colonel Thomas to destroy it. Apparently, Anderson
considered it too damning to the Administration.
AWESOME DECISIONS AND SUMTER S FALL 37
Sumter would not be changed without previous notice to Governor
Pickens, but we have no faith in them. The war policy prevails in the
Cabinet at this time." This dispatch was also relayed to Montgomery.
As President Davis knew, the Confederate Commissioners in Wash-
ington were pressing Seward for "a definite disposition" to their note
of March 12, delivered several weeks past. While Federal warships
and transports plowed the Atlantic on their way to Charleston, Seward
coolly wrote that he must decline official intercourse with the Com-
missioners, for he did not admit or assume that the states they repre-
sented had withdrawn from the Union.
On April 9, the frustrated Peace Commissioners composed their
final note to the Lincoln Administration, accusing it of trickery. In the
copy sent to him, President Davis read:
Your refusal to entertain these overtures for a peaceful solution, the
active naval and military preparations, and the formal notice . . . that the
President intends to provision Fort Sumter by forcible means, if necessary
. . . can only be received by the world as a declaration of war. . . . For the
President of the United States knows that Fort Sumter cannot be provisioned
without the effusion of blood. . . .
The undersigned are not aware of any Constitutional power in the Presi-
dent of the United States to levy war, without the consent of Congress, upon
a foreign People, much less upon any portion of the People of the United
States. . . .
Whatever may be the result, impartial history will record the innocence of
the Government of the Confederate States, and place the responsibility of the
blood and mourning that may ensue upon those who have denied the great
fundamental doctrine of American liberty, that "Governments derive their
just powers from the consent of the governed," and who have set naval and
land armaments in motion to subject the people of one portion of this land
to the will of another portion.
The Commissioners' last dispatch to the Confederate Government,
dated April 10, merely reported something they had read in a New
York paper: "The Tribune of today declares the main object of the
expedition to be the relief of Sumter, and that a force will be landed
which will overcome all opposition."
On that same day, the rival New York Herald, which, as Carl Sand-
burg noted, spoke for "a variety of powerful interests," daringly de-
clared: "Our only hope now against civil war of an indefinite duration
seems to lie in the overthrow of the demoralizing, disorganizing and
destructive sectional party, of which 'honest Abe Lincoln' is the pliant
instrument."
38 JEFFERSON DAVIS
Throughout the Confederacy, from city sidewalks to crossroad
stores, tautness was evident in eyes and voices. "Why doesn't Jeff
Davis act?" men asked each other. "Why doesn't he take Sumter be-
fore the Yankees get there?"
Davis knew well how the people felt. But he could not tell them that
however much he questioned Seward's manipulations, he must gamble
on Seward's good intentions. To strike a blow too soon would be a fatal
error. The President was pleased to read in the Montgomery Daily
Mail of April 9 a defense of his caution and a tribute of confidence.
It was a personal letter to the editor from New Orleans, which he pub-
lished because he deemed it u a just and noble tribute to the Southern
President."
You may rest assured that he (Pres. Davis) will prove himself fully equal
to the responsible position he occupies.
He has done more than conquer an empire; he is complete master of him-
self, and will meet every obstacle in the path of the Confederacy with a cool
and unclouded judgment not with the impetuosity of a soldier, but with the
higher courage of a commander. . . .
The greatest of all victories is a bloodless one, and if it is possible to
achieve it, our Commander-in-Chief will do it. ...
Keep cool . . . and be assured that the policy of Jeff. Davis will soon
vindicate itself. . . . The honor of our young Republic is safe in his hands.
Because of raging rumors of war, coolness was not a recognizable
quality in the new republic. In Montgomery, great excitement pre-
vailed. On the tenth, Leroy Walker could hardly get in and out of his
War Department office for the turbulent throng of anxious visitors.
"All seem to concur," reported the Montgomery Daily Mail, "that
'war is inevitable', and they are 'ready, willing and awaiting' the firing
of the first gun; and, with their muskets and knapsacks, are ready, at
a moment's warning, to march in defense of their country's right and
honor."
Letters and telegrams from persons important and obscure came
pouring into President Davis's office. On April 10, he received an im-
perative telegram from his old friend Senator Louis Wigfall, now in
Charleston.
No one now doubts that Lincoln intends War. The delay on his part is
only to complete his preparations. All here is ready on our side. Our delay
therefore is to his advantage, and our disadvantage. Let us take Fort
Sumter, before we have to fight the fleet and the Fort. General Beauregard
will not act without your order. Let me suggest to you to send the order to
AWESOME DECISIONS AND SUMTEIl's FALL 39
him to begin the attack as soon as he is ready. Virginia is excited by the
preparations, and a bold stroke on our side will complete her purposes.
Policy and prudence are urgent upon us to begin at once. . . .
While President Davis was counseling cool patience, the Charleston
Courier of April 10 publicly sounded a war cry: "Let the strife begin
we have no fear of the issue." That day impetuous Roger Pryor, the
Virginian who had resigned his seat in Congress after Lincoln's inau-
guration, arrived in Charleston to stir up excitement. In an im-
passioned speech before a large street crowd, the aristocratic young
firebrand urged the Confederate forces "to strike a blow." "I will tell
your Governor what will put Virginia in the Southern Confederacy in
less than an hour by Shrewsbury's clock. Strike a blow!"
That same April 10, Beauregard telegraphed the Secretary of War
that Lincoln would definitely try to reinforce Sumter immediately.
President Davis summoned his Cabinet. A grave discussion was under
way when Secretary of State Toombs arrived late. He was handed
Beauregard's telegram, which he read standing. Scowling, he said
darkly: "The firing upon the fort will inaugurate a civil war greater
than any the world has yet seen; and I do not feel competent to advise
you." Toombs was too agitated to sit. He walked the floor, eyes on the
carpet, hands clasped tight behind his back. While the discussion pro-
ceeded at the table, the Secretary of State continued his moody pacing.
At last, he halted, whirled around, and cried out: "At this time, to fire
is suicide. It will lose us every friend at the North. You will wantonly
strike a hornet's nest. Legions now quiet will swarm out and sting us
to death!" 2 But he confessed he had no helpful solution to offer.
Jefferson Davis regarded the situation from every angle, weighed
the risks each way. To him and to the general Southern mind, as Pro-
fessor Randall wrote, "Lincoln's plan to relieve Sumter seemed a
threat, a challenge, and a breach of faith." Like Toombs, Davis clearly
saw the advantage to the side that caused the other to fire the first shot.
If, however, to avoid firing first, he tamely allowed the fort to be sup-
plied and strengthened, the effectiveness of Charleston both strate-
gically and commercially would be lost and, worse, the integrity of
the Confederacy would be so traduced that dissolution might result.
Yet if he reduced the fort flying the American flag, the Federal Gov-
a Whether Toombs made precisely this Cassandra speech is not certain; but Ulrich
Phillips follows Pleasant A, Stovall in quoting the lines. Rembert Patrick discredits
the story.
4O JEFFERSON DAVIS
ernment would have its excuse for launching a war of subjugation. The
cards seemed stacked to Mr. Lincoln's advantage.
All of Davis's Cabinet, except possibly Bob Toombs, agreed that
the Charleston defenses must not be caught in a crossfire between Fort
Sumter and Federal warships. The President heard his advisers out.
Then he decided to sleep over the matter. He postponed a reply to
Beauregard until the next day.
Precious little sleep the President got that night. Of all the decisions
in his public life, the one he now faced was perhaps the most momen-
tous. The destiny of millions was involved. The prolonged horrors of
fratricidal warfare, infinitely more dreadful than fighting foes of alien
blood, rose up before him. He earnestly prayed for Divine guidance.
The next morning, supported by the majority of his Cabinet, but
with Toombs not voting, the President asked Beauregard to demand
evacuation of Fort Sumter, and if the ultimatum should be refused,
to reduce it.
On the afternoon of April n, under a flag of truce, Beauregard's
aides, Colonel James Chesnut, Jr., and Captain Stephen D. Lee, set
out in a small boat and conveyed the ultimatum. Deeply perturbed,
Major Anderson debated with himself. Because of the recent letter
from his government, Ije decided that he could not in honor comply.
As he handed his formal reply to Chesnut, he remarked sadly, with a
resigned smile, "I will await the first shot." Then he added, as if casu-
ally: "If you do not batter us to pieces we will be starved out in a few
days." Along with the result of the visit, Beauregard communicated
to Montgomery Anderson's significant last remark.
When President Davis received the report, he understood the miser-
able quandary of his old friend Bob Anderson, as clearly as he saw
through Lincoln's maneuver to make the South shoot. Knowing that
the fort must not be reinforced and that time was running out, he yet
made one last effort to avoid war. He had Secretary of War Walker
telegraph Beauregard.
We do not desire needlessly to bombard Fort Sumter. If Major Anderson
will state the time ... at which he will evacuate, and agree that in the
meantime he will not use his guns against us unless ours should be employed
against Fort Sumter, we will abstain from opening fire. You are thus to avoid
the effusion of blood. If this or its equivalent be refused, reduce the fort as
your judgement decides to be the most practicable.
The eyes of the entire nation were fixed, like those of Jefferson
Davis, on that little sea-girt mass of rock and sand surmounted by
AWESOME DECISIONS AND SUMTER S FALL 41
pentagonal works of red brick in Charleston Harbor. News editors
were on the alert for the message that would mean evacuation or re-
duction, peace or war. In Washington, William Howard Russell, bril-
liant correspondent for the London Times, packed his bags for
Charleston.
Anderson's refusal to withdraw had passed by word of mouth until
every Charlestonian knew that the powder keg was about to explode.
The tension was such that the nerves of some cried out for the cannon's
roar, while others shuddered with apprehension. But of one thing they
were all determined: armed ships of an alien nation must not be al-
lowed in Charleston waters.
Rumors circulated that the Confederate batteries would open fire
at eight o'clock that evening, April n. The Federal fleet was hourly
expected. Thousands gathered on Charleston's esplanade and peered
steadily into the darkness toward Sumter and Fort Johnson. But
across the water nothing whatever broke the utter stillness. When the
clock in St. Michael's tower struck eleven, all but the most determined
watchers began plodding home to catch some sleep. None knew that
at some time after nine o'clock General Beauregard had received that
second temporizing message from Montgomery.
At that very hour of eleven, Beauregard prepared another communi-
cation conveying the substance of the Secretary of War's directive.
"If," he wrote Major Anderson, "you will state the time at which you
will evacuate Fort Sumter we will abstain from opening fire upon you."
Then he sent Colonel Chesnut, Captain Lee, and Lieutenant Colonel
A. R. Chisholm, all three South Carolinians, with full authorization to
enter into an agreement with Anderson. This time that fiery young
Virginian Roger Pryor, so eager to strike a blow, accompanied the em-
issaries.
The missive was presented. Anderson held a midnight conference
with his top officers. His second in command, Major Abner Doubleday,
a New Yorker, who later achieved fame as the "father" of baseball,
urged defiance of the Rebels. At length, Anderson retired to a private
Gethsemane in his room. Few good men were ever faced with such a
soul-searching decision. A dutiful soldier and a loyal Unionist, Ander-
son was also a Kentuckian, and married to a Georgian; he loved the
Southern people. If he had not misguidedly moved from Motdtrie to
Sumter on that fateful Christmas night, "to prevent an effusion of
blood," he would not be in his present miserable dilemma! If to avoid
a war between the states he now agreed to evacuation before the gar-
42 JEFFERSON DAVIS
rison's last slab of salt pork was gone, Anderson knew he would be
branded as a traitor. The alternative might eventually involve a whole
sea of blood, and right now his men would be facing personal destruc-
tion.
After painful, almost unbearable, deliberation, at half past two in
the morning of April 12, Robert Anderson took up his pen to compose a
formal reply. "I will," he wrote, "if provided with the proper and nec-
essary means of transportation evacuate Fort Sumter by noon of the
15th instant, and I will not in the meantime open my fire upon your
forces unless compelled to do so by some hostile act against this fort
or the flag of my Government by the forces under your com-
mand . . ."
Anderson paused. If he had stopped there, the course of American
history might have been different. The moment was pregnant with des-
tiny. But the Major felt impelled to add a restrictive clause. He wrote
on: "should I not receive prior to that time controlling instructions
from my Government or additional supplies."
When the ink was dry, the communication was handed to Colonel
Chesnut, who read it with mounting hope until he came to the proviso.
For half an hour he and the other emissaries deliberated. The condi-
tions Anderson imposed could not be accepted. The relief expedition
was overdue off the Charleston coast. Though they did not know it,
the Harriet Lane had already arrived at the rendezvous, and at 3 ;oo
A.M. Captain Fox, on the Baltic, communicated with her commander, 3
Beauregard's aides reckoned much as did William T. Sherman: "If
Major Anderson can hold out till relieved and supported by steam
frigates, South Carolina will find herself unable to control her com-
merce." Instead of returning to present the case to General Beaure-
gard, who might just possibly have deemed it expedient to ask further
instructions from President Davis, Chesnut requested paper and pen.
He addressed to Major Anderson a single sentence of colossal import.
"By authority of Brigadier General Beauregard, commanding the
provisional forces of the Confederate States, we have the honor to
notify you that he will open the fire of his batteries on Fort Sumter in
one hour from this time." The time recorded was: "3:20 A,M."
Major Anderson accepted the decision ruefully. As the Confederates
took their courteous leave, they saw that he was deeply moved. Ander-
*The Pawnee was sighted at 6:00 A.M. The Pocahontas, another man-of-war, steamed
up the following day. The tugs Yankee and Uncle Ben had been blown from their
course by a severe storm: one had sought refuge at Wilmington, the other near Savannah.
AWESOME DECISIONS AND SXIMTER S FALL 43
son did them the honor of accompanying them down to their little boat
and seeing them into it. In brotherly farewell he pressed their hands,
one after another. As the Confederates pulled away, the Kentuckian
called out softly, "If we never meet in this world again, God grant
that we may meet in the next.' 7
Exhausted from staring out toward Sumter, Mrs. Chesnut had
finally gone to bed after midnight. She could not close her eyes : her hus-
band was somewhere out on the dark water between rival trained guns.
The previous afternoon she had bewailed in her diary: "Why did that
green goose Anderson go into Fort Sumter? Now they have intercepted
a letter from him urging them to let him surrender. He paints the hor-
rors likely to ensue if they will not. He ought to have thought of all
that before he put his head in the hole."
Mary Chesnut lay sleepless, knowing that "if Anderson does not
accept terms at four, the orders are, he shall be fired upon." When the
bells of St. Michael's began to chime the hour of four, she held her
breath. A deep silence enveloped the night. She began to breathe nor-
mally, and closed her eyes in blessed relief. Half an hour passed in
stillness. Then came an ominous boom. She sprang out of bed, and on
her "knees prostrate" she prayed as she had never prayed before.
At half past four on that morning of April 12, the first shot was fired
from Fort Johnson. The distinction of sending the first shell had been
offered to Roger Pryor, but the ardent young man could not bring him-
self to do it. So the doubtful honor went to venerable, white-locked
Edmund Ruffin, noted Virginia agriculturist and for thirty years edi-
tor of the authoritative Farmer's Register, He had been more eager
than Pryor to put his Old Dominion into the Confederacy. The mili-
tant Ruffin, who was passionately interested in the South's betterment,
was "highly gratified by the compliment and delighted to perform the
service." 4
The signal gun from Fort Johnson set the other batteries to firing.
The prolonged prologue was over. America's tragedy had begun.
In the first faint streak of dawn that Friday morning, the roar of
distant guns and the flash of flame arching across the black water elec-
trified the straggling watchers on Charleston's Battery. And as cannon
after cannon boomed at two-minute intervals from the different forts
and floating batteries, the crowds increased. Houses disgorged their
*On receiving news of Lee's surrender at Appomattox four years later, Ruffin shot
again: he put a pistol to his head and blew his brains out.
44 JEFFERSON DAVIS
people. Flat roofs, piazzas, balconies, and widow's-walks became
thronged. Men, still arranging their outer clothing, rushed to the sea
front, followed shortly by their womenfolk. No festival ever brought
more girls to the promenade; most of them had sweethearts, husbands,
sons, brothers, or fathers among Beauregard's forces.
For a couple of hours, the citizens were relieved and somewhat in-
credulous that no answering shots came from the guns of Sumter.
Then, at seven o'clock, when watchers were stealing away to snatch
some breakfast, the Stars and Stripes was run up above Sumter. Ander-
son's cannoneers began pouring iron hail on Fort Moultrie, on
Stevens's battery, and on the floating batteries. Detonations jarred the
ears of spectators, and the smell of saltpeter bit at their nostrils. As
the smoke blew across the harbor, the eastern sky turned dark with
lowering rain clouds.
In Montgomery, President Davis, sleepless, awaited Anderson's an-
swer. Before breakfast, he had his Secretary of War telegraph Beaure-
gard to ask specifically what the Major's reply was to his proposition
contained in last night's dispatch. The General sent back seven words.
Walker brought the telegram to the President. Davis read the remark-
able understatement: "He would not consent. I write today."
Whatever pain the laconic message brought to his heart, Jefferson
Davis received it with his usual outward calm. He had hoped with all
his soul that conflict might be prevented. Extremely reluctant to fire
on Sumter, he had yet been unceasingly aware that "the purpose of his
office was the defense of the Confederate States at every point." Even
Horace Greeley, with his intense partisan feeling, was to admit that
"whether the bombardment and reduction of Fort Sumter shall or shall
not be justified by posterity, it is clear that the Confederacy had no al-
ternative but its own dissolution."
As a soldier, aware of the strength of the opposing batteries, Davis
could envision what might be taking place. If the Northern warships
had arrived to join in the fight, the Confederates would be having a
stiff battle. In any case, he knew Bob Anderson for a brave officer who
would not easily surrender under fire; the Sumter garrison might be
annihilated. Davis had often told provincial Southerners, in so many
words, that "only fools doubted the courage of the Yankees."
In Charleston a leaden drizzle began to dull the scene for spectators,
as flaming shot "roofed the sky," pouring into Sumter and onto Con-
federate batteries. All day long the people, aghast, thought they were
AWESOME DECISIONS AND SUMTER^S FALL 45
witnessing a holocaust. On the roof tops, some women sobbed with
hysteria, while others prayed with all their might.
In Montgomery, on that night of April 12, according to the Daily
Mail, "at a late hour, 1000 persons or more, with a band of music,"
gathered in front of the Exchange Hotel to serenade the President. Mr.
Davis, deep in affliction of spirit at the shooting in progress in Charles-
ton, appreciated the demonstration of affection, but he could not rouse
himself to face his admirers. He asked his Secretary of War, who lived
in the hotel, to make his excuses. Leroy Walker appeared on the bal-
cony and explained that the President had been so closely confined by
his arduous duties that he greatly needed repose. Then he himself
made "a brief, stirring, patriotic speech" and told the President's well-
wishers that four of Sumter's big guns had already been silenced by
Beauregard's batteries. The President heard the loud cheering, fol-
lowed by more music in his honor. When at last the crowd departed,
he felt assured of one thing: the South was valiantly determined to re-
sist invasion, whatever the odds.
In Charleston, the April weather turned unseasonably cold that his-
toric night. As harsh winds drove the rain, the firing gradually relaxed.
Then watchers saw a crescent moon break through the clouds and
hang clear for a few minutes; they took it for a good omen. And in the
early morning, as the sun burst forth in the refreshed atmosphere, wit-
nesses, passing St. Phillip's churchyard, where John C. Calhoun lay
buried, saw a gamecock fly to the top of the great man's tomb, flap his
wings and crow, as if in victory.
"From four to six-thirty a.m., the enemy's fire was very spirited,"
wrote Major Abner Doubleday in Reminiscences of Fort Sumter.
Nineteen Confederate batteries, encircling four sides of Sumter's pen-
tagon, hammered away. Balls and shells from ten-inch columbiads
poured into the fort. At seven, when a fresh rainstorm came on for an
hour, there was a lull in Beauregard's cannonading. Then as the bat-
teries renewed the bombardment with full force, the officers' quarters
of Sumter caught fire from an incendiary shell. When that fire was put
out, a mortar shell lodged in the roof, and flames burst out anew. By
eleven o'clock, in Doubleday's words, "the conflagration was terrible
and disastrous." The magazine holding three hundred barrels of pow-
der was in danger of explosion. The men were almost suffocated; some
crawled on the ground, holding wet handkerchiefs over their mouths.
"The roaring and crackling of the flames, the dense masses of whirling
smoke, the bursting of the enemy's shells and our own exploding in
46 JEFFERSON DAVIS
the burning rooms, the sound of masonry falling in every direction,
made the fort a pandemonium."
Shots from Sumter came so infrequently now that, at each futile
blast, Confederate soldiers would leap up on their parapets and cheer
the game Yankees, who were taking such hellish punishment. They
mocked and hooted the Federal ships that did not come in to Ander-
son's rescue, but were bobbing idly about on the choppy water beyond
the reef.
The soldiers viewing them did not know, any more than did Jeffer-
son Davis in Montgomery, that frustrated Captain Fox on the Baltic
was longing desperately to get into the fight, particularly since he was
the master originator of the expedition, and expected fame. But Cap-
tain S. C. Rowan, commander of the warship Pawnee, absolutely re-
fused to venture in with the Baltic. Rowan stood firm on his orders,
which he told Fox "required him to remain ten miles east of the light
and wait the Powhatan." "I am not going in there/' he declared, "to
inaugurate civil war." Naturally, neither the Confederates at Charles-
ton nor the President in Montgomery suspected that Seward's counter-
maneuver had rendered impotent the "relief" squadron by depriving
it of its flagship, the Powhatan, which carried the orders as well as the
launches and the sailors to man them.
Shortly before one o'clock, the Sumter flagstaff was shot in two.
Former Senator Wigfall, seeing the Stars and Stripes go down in the
dense smoke, and eager to stop the imagined carnage in the garrison,
took it upon himself to secure surrender. Commanding two terrified
Negroes to be his oarsmen, the huge, fierce-eyed "stormy petrel"
leaped into a rowboat, fixed his linen handkerchief to the point of his
sword and thrust it aloft. While cannon balls flew over his head, he
was rowed to Sumter. Oddly, no one from the garrison saw the strange
spectacle of WigfalFs approach or noted him clambering up a rocky
ledge. A gunner was flabbergasted to behold a flushed human face ap-
pear beside his cannon's mouth in an embrasure. Squeezing through
the opening, the self-appointed emissary demanded to be taken to
Major Anderson.
Wigfall, who had not been in contact with Beauregard for thirty
hours, offered Anderson generous terms of surrender. Believing Wig-
fall had authority, the Major accepted them, requesting to be allowed
to salute his flag on departing. Wigfall agreed. Across the water, the
amazed Beauregard, who had just seen the American flag run up again
on an improvised flagpole, now beheld it brought down and a white
one hoisted.
AWESOME DECISIONS AND SUMTER S FALL 47
Later that afternoon, Secretary of War Walker took President Davis
a telegram from General Beauregard. "We take possession of Fort
Sumter tomorrow morning. I allow him the privilege of saluting his
flag. No one killed on our side."
When further information reached Montgomery that not a single
Union man had been killed by Confederate fire, it seemed to Davis like
a special dispensation of Providence. In wiring congratulations to
Beauregard, Davis indicated no hint of triumph. Half of his message
attested to his concern for the defeated Federals. His magnanimity
of spirit was inherent in his simple words: "Thanks for your achieve-
ment and for your courtesy to the garrison of Sumter. If occasion of-
fers, tender my friendly remembrance to Major Anderson."
The next day, April 14, the people in Montgomery were satisfied and
elated. The President read in the Daily Advertiser an editorial en-
titled "Glory Enough For One Day." "The intelligence that Fort Sum-
ter surrendered to the Confederate forces yesterday sent a thrill of joy
to the heart of every true friend of the South. The face of every South-
ern man was brighter, his step lighter, and his bearing prouder, than
it had been before."
On that Sunday morning, the exhausted Sumter garrison stood at
attention as salutes to their flag were fired. On the last and fiftieth
round, a cannon burst. A private was killed and five others wounded.
The first serious casualty occurred after the battle was over.
Beauregard courteously stayed away from Sumter until his former
instructor in artillery had departed. When the ship bearing the de-
feated garrison passed Cummings' Point, the Confederates lined up
respectfully with heads uncovered. Anderson had defended Fort
Sumter for thirty-four grueling hours, "until," as he reported officially,
"the quarters were entirely burned, the main gates destroyed by fire,
the gorge walls seriously injured, the magazine surrounded by flames."
He sailed off to a hero's reward. A few Northern papers, however, con-
demned his surrender as treachery. Had his men suffered annihilation
and martyrdom, the Lincoln Government might have had a clearer
conscience for beginning a war.
When Anderson's steamer passed out of sight, General Beauregard
and Governor Pickens took possession of the wrecked fort. As the
flags of South Carolina and the Confederacy were run up, boatloads
of excursionists set out from Charleston. The South went into jubila-
tion. Northern papers were emblazoned with flaming headlines.
Though their editors could not cry out that American blood had been
spilled, they burst into tirades about the insult to the flag.
CHAPTER IV
LINCOLN CALLS FOR
TROOPS
DURING the terrific strain of the Sumter reduction on Saturday,
President Davis looked up from his desk to find the Secretary of War
glumly holding a telegraphic dispatch from Braxton Bragg, com-
mander of the Confederate forces at Pensacola. "Re-enforcements
thrown into Fort Pickens last night by small boats from the outside.
The movement could not even be seen from our side, but was discov-
ered by a small boat reconnoitering," Walker had cause to look
stricken. "The Yankees," he said, "have violated their agreement."
Davis received the news quietly; but it was a serious blow. The re-
inforcement of Pickens, which commanded the harbor of Pensacola,
made the seaport useless to the Confederacy.
Davis did not know that Seward had advocated the strengthening
of more remote Fort Pickens, because there, the Secretary of State had
argued cogently, "the psychology of the situation was quite different
from that of Charleston." Seward did not believe war would neces-
sarily result from any encounter at Pickens. He had urged President
Lincoln to show firmness by reinforcing Pickens, and to avoid war by
evacuating Sumter.
An armistice in regard to Pickens had been in effect since the end
of January. The day Florida seceded, January 10, the Federal com-
mander at Pensacola had imitated Major Anderson and moved his
garrison from Fort Barrancas on the mainland to Fort Pickens on
Santa Rosa Island. Confederate volunteers had then promptly taken
over Fort Barrancas and the Navy Yard. On January 24, the warship
Brooklyn had been sent to Fort Pickens with men, artillery, military
stores, and provisions. But Stephen Mallory, then Senator from Flor-
48
LINCOLN CALLS FOR TROOPS 49
ida, and some other Southerners made a truce with President Bu-
chanan in which the Administration agreed "not to disembark the
troops from the Brooklyn," and the Confederate commander promised
not to attack the fort. The Cabinet and General Scott approved the
agreement, which permitted the landing of the provisions but not one
armed man.
Despite the agreement in effect, just eight days after his inaugura-
tion, Lincoln had General Scott send an order to seize the first favor-
able opportunity to get the soldiers from the Brooklyn into the fort.
Either the order did not reach Captain Henry Adams, commander of
Federal naval forces, until March 31 or he chose to ignore it until that
date.
Adams, who held the initial papers constituting the agreement, was
perturbed at the new directive. He refused to comply without further
instruction. On April i, he sent a special messenger to Washington
with a protesting letter and a copy of General Scott's questionable or-
der.
In a belt strapped under his shirt, Naval Lieutenant Washington
Gwathmey brought the documents to Secretary of the Navy Welles.
Adams reminded the Lincoln Administration that "he was operating
under an armistice which both are faithfully observing. " As recently
as March 30, General Bragg had reassured him the conditions would
not be violated by the Confederates. He himself was concerned over
"the fearful responsibility of an act which seems to render civil war
inevitable." When Welles took the letter to Lincoln, the President de-
cided to disregard the agreement, without informing the Confederates.
The Secretary of the Navy then prepared an unequivocal order for
Captain Adams to put the soldiers into the fort. But Lieutenant
Gwathmey refused to take back such an answer; he was resigning
from the United States Navy immediately, he said, to join the Con-
federate forces.
Welles chose Lieutenant John L. Worden for the job, instructed him
to memorize the dispatch, and then destroy it. On arrival at Pensacola
on the afternoon of April n, Worden secured an interview with Gen-
eral Bragg, His simulated sincerity so impressed the Confederate com-
mander that he gave the officer permission to take his "verbal message
of a pacific nature" to Captain Adams. The next morning Worden
made a copy of the memorized message and delivered it to the dis-
mayed Commander. That afternoon he took the cars and sped from
Pensacola.
5O JEFFERSON DAVIS
About the time the message was being delivered, General Bragg re-
ceived a telegram from Secretary Walker ordering him to intercept
Worden's dispatches. But Bragg had already fallen into the same trap
as had South Carolina's Governor with Gustavus Fox. He wired Mont-
gomery: "Mr. Worden had communicated with fleet before your dis-
patch received. Alarm guns have just fired at Fort Pickens. I fear the
news is received and it will be reenforced before morning. It cannot be
prevented. . . . m
That night the artillery company from the warship was slipped into
the fort. 2 In the hullabaloo let loose by events at Sumter, the Pickens
gesture that Seward had believed might make up to the Republican
radicals for a peaceful Sumter evacuation was hardly noticed.
President Davis remarked wryly to Secretary Walker that the 8,000
Confederates at Pensacola could have taken Fort Pickens if "mere
considerations of military advantage had been consulted." Though he
had been aware of the dissatisfaction of some "ardent advocates of
more active measures/' he had been scrupulously careful not to make
any move that might initiate war. "It may be that they were right,"
he subsequently wrote, "and that we who counselled delay and for-
bearance were wrong. Certainly, if we could have foreseen the perfidy
that was practised our advice would have been different." 8
Jefferson Davis thereafter looked upon "the enemy" as not to be
trusted. Reviewing the Sumter affair, and, incidentally, that of
Pickens, he wrote:
The history of the negotiations with the Federal Government is the
narration of a protracted course of fraud and prevarication practised by
Mr. Lincoln's administration. Every pledge made was broken, and every
assurance of good faith was followed by an act of perfidy. The remonstrances,
the patient and reiterated attempts of the South Carolina and Confederate
Commissioners to open negotiations had been met by evasion and pre-
varication. It was evident that no confidence could be placed in any pledge
1 Worden got off on the train before Bragg knew of his return from Pickens. He was
arrested in Montgomery, but because nothing could be proved he was released. Later,
at the Battle of Hampton Roads, March 9, 1862, it was Worden who commanded the
Monitor.
a Captain David Porter on "Seward's" Powhatan arrived at Pensacola five days after
the deed was accomplished. So cleverly camouflaged was the warship that even those
who knew her well were baffled when she steamed up flying British colors.
8 After reinforcement, Fort Pickens held a garrison of 992 soldiers and had six months'
supplies, while the four warships standing by had an aggregate of 1,025 nien, with six
hundred more men en route on the Minnesota. The figures are taken from Captain M. C.
Meigs's report to Chief Engineer Joseph G. Totten as reprinted in Official Records.
Throughout the war, Fort Pickens flew the United States flag.
LINCOLN CALLS FOR TROOPS 51
or promise of the Federal Government. Yet no resistance other than that of
pacific protest and appeals for an equitable settlement was made until . . .
it was known that a hostile fleet was on the way to support and enforce it.
The forbearance of the Confederate Government in the circumstances is
held up as unexampled in history. It was carried to the verge of disregard of
the safety of the people who had entrusted to that Government the duty of
their defence.
To have waited further strengthening of the enemy by land and vessel
forces, with hostile purpose, now declared, for the sake of having them "fire
the first gun," would have been as unwise as it would be to hesitate to strike
down an assailant who levels a deadly weapon at one's heart until he has
actually fired. He who makes the assault is not necessarily he who strikes the
first blow or fires the first gun.
To Jefferson Davis, Seward's behavior seemed only to point to arrant
duplicity. But Seward, naturally, could not tell the Confederate com-
missioners of Lincoln's decision to send a relief force to Sumter, lest
the Confederates immediately reduce the fort and stir up such North-
ern antagonism as could not be appeased. And besides, until the very
last hour, Seward hoped that he could dissuade Lincoln from actually
giving the order for the Sumter expedition to move. He had reason for
his hope. The historian James Ford Rhodes maintains that while Lin-
coln had virtually decided on April 4 to send it, he reserved in his mind
"the privilege of countermanding it or changing its destination should
he hear that his former order touching Pickens had been executed."
If Fort Pickens had been successfully reinforced before April 5, would
Mr. Lincoln have let the Sumter expedition sail?
According to Secretary Welles's diary, "Military preparations were
made, and a squadron was promptly fitted out by the Navy Depart-
ment within a week of the executive order to cooperate with the mili-
tary. But the whole plan and arrangement were defeated. At the mo-
ment of sailing, the expedition was deprived of its commander and
flagship without the knowledge of the Secretary of Navy. . , . The
Powhatan, with boats, supplies, and men destined for Sumter had been
sent . . . without naval orders or record, under a secret and useless
mission to Pensacola, by the Secretary of State." When the Sumter
squadron finally arrived at the rendezvous, it was "destitute of a naval
commander, flagship, and instructions."
On April 6, after the Powhatan had sailed, with a substitute com-
mander chosen by Seward, the Secretary of the Navy discovered some-
thing amiss. Welles burst into the President's office in a blazing, ac-
cusing fury. Lincoln looked up from his desk and, seeing the extraordi-
52 JEFFERSON DAVIS
nary expression of Welles's face, asked defensively, "What have I
done wrong? 7 ' Welles handed him two papers with the President's un-
deniable signature. Lincoln said he must have signed the orders with-
out reading them "for he had not time, and if he could not trust the
Secretary of State, he knew not whom he could trust."
President Lincoln had originally given his approval to Welles's in-
structions to Captain Samuel Mercer as commander of the Powhatan,
the flagship which would carry the orders. At the last hour, in the
President's name, Seward sent a contrary secret order to Captain An-
drew H. Foote of the New York Navy Yard that Lieutenant David D.
Porter should take command of the Powhatan. Porter was to proceed,
not to Sumter, but to Fort Pickens.
It turned out that Seward had worked secretly with Captain Mont-
gomery Meigs, an army engineer, whom Jefferson Davis as Secretary
of War had put in charge of the Capitol's reconstruction work. He
wanted Meigs to lead the military expedition to Fort Pickens, which
would include the soldiers on the Powhatan and those in readiness on
the battleships anchored near Santa Rosa Island. On April i, together
they prepared the new orders for the President's signature, which
Seward did secure.
Meigs wrote in his diary: "I was by [the] President made respon-
sible and told not to let even the Secretary of the Navy know that this
expedition was going on." 4 Lieutenant David Porter was handed con-
fidential orders signed by Lincoln, one of which he presented to Foote.
The latter order read :
Sir: You will fit out the Powhatan without delay. Lieutenant Porter will
relieve Captain Mercer in command of her. She is bound on secret service,
and you will under no circumstances communicate to the Navy Department
the fact that she is being fitted out.
Abraham Lincoln
At Welles's insistent demand, the President asked his Secretary of
State to telegraph and countermand his order to Porter. Seward remon-
strated; but with the accusing eyes of Welles upon him, Lincoln be-
came "imperative." Reluctantly, Seward dispatched a telegram to the
naval authorities in New York: "Give the Powhatan to Captain
Mercer. Seward." He cannily sent it in his own name and not that of
the President.
At 3:00 P.M., when the Powhatan was out of sight, the bewildered
4 Montgomery C. Meigs's diary, March 29-April 8, 1861, appeared in American His-
torical Review, Vol. XXVI, 1920-21.
LINCOLN CALLS FOR TROOPS 53
Captain Foote of the Navy Yard chartered a steamer to chase the war-
ship. It was overtaken just as it reached the open sea. The message
was delivered. But Porter, having in hand orders with President Lin-
coln's undoubted signature, refused to relinquish command. "I re-
ceived my orders from the President/ 7 he said, "and shall proceed and
execute them." The Powhatan steamed off for remote Pensacola.
Apparently the wily Secretary of State had outfoxed Gustavus Fox
and everybody else who was willing to start a war. Seward's real back-
stage maneuvering in Washington was not suspected by Jefferson
Davis in Montgomery. All that he knew was that a fleet of armed ships
had sailed for Charleston, and Seward had seemingly deluded Justice
Campbell.
Having deprived the expedition of its flagship and instructions,
Seward may have felt he had averted war, for it was the next day that
he wrote "Faith as to Sumter fully kept. Wait and see." And because
he had promised that if there was a change in attitude about evacua-
tion he would notify Charleston, he had sent Chew to Charleston to
carry out the letter of that promise.
It was all a complicated maze of deceptions, but Seward's audacious
craft was practiced in the best possible cause, the cause of peace. Jef-
ferson Davis little dreamed how desperately Seward schemed behind
the scenes to avoid armed conflict. When subsequent events turned
out as they did, Seward undoubtedly hoped the Republicans would
never know the full extent of his manipulations. Though he could not
bear the idea of disunion, to him a real war between the states was al-
most too horrible to contemplate. He was convinced that conciliatory
policies would woo the South back into the Union.
Was Abraham Lincoln a party to Seward's daring move for the sake
of peace? Seward had indubitably secured Lincoln's signature not only
to that changed secret order concerning the Powhatan, but to other
orders pertaining thereto. Dr. Randall, the most scholarly of Lincoln's
admiring biographers, believed that Lincoln did not read the Porter
order before he signed it. But such carelessness seems hardly likely in
the canny Lincoln, who was keenly aware of Seward's cunning.
Gustavus Fox wrote his wife: "Mr. Seward got up this Pensacola
expedition and the President signed the orders in ignorance and un-
known to the Department. The President offers every apology passi-
ble," But on May n, 1861, when the nation was bristling with armed
men, President Lincoln himself assumed responsibility for the secret
change in orders, which most historians attribute to the "bungling" or
54 JEFFERSON DAVIS
"meddling" or "madness" of Seward, claiming that Lincoln did not
know what he signed. The letter, as it appears in Official Records,
Navy (Series I, Vol. IV, p. 239), seems conclusive:
Lieutenant D. D. Porter was placed in command of the Steamer Powhatan
and Captain Samuel Mercer was detached therefrom by my special order,
and neither of them is responsible for any apparent or real irregularity on
their part in connection with that vessel. . . .
Abraham Lincoln
Did Mr. Lincoln, at the very brink of war, agree with his Secretary
of State and attempt to draw back? By merely launching the supply
fleet he would have shown firmness and satisfied the Blairs and the
radicals. If through some switch in orders, for which his Secretary of
State was willing to take the blame, the expedition did not enter the
harbor, could the President himself be censured? If Anderson with-
drew his forces "to avoid starvation," who could blame the President
for that?
Many persons will agree with Professor Randall that what one finds
hardest to reconcile with the evidence is the supposition that "all the
while the President was planning a war-provoking maneuver." Yet
Randall points up the weight of influence of those strategic persons
or groups who urged Lincoln to evacuate Sumter: General Scott and
other leaders of the army; that influential and adroit Republican
Thurlow Weed; leading Democrats and Unionists like Stephen Doug-
las and Andrew Johnson, The Border States were overwhelmingly in
favor of withdrawal. Even some of the extreme antislavery radicals
favored withdrawal.
On one thing almost everyone, North and South, seemed to concur:
reinforcing Suniter meant armed conflict. President Davis had made
it clear that it was his duty to protect the Confederacy at every point.
He could not let armed alien ships enter Charleston Harbor, and, since
the Confederate States had assumed the position of an independent
nation, no foreign power "should retain a strong fortress commanding
one of their important harbors."
"In a sense of frustration," one can ask with Professor Randall,
"Why did not Mr. Lincoln follow all the weight of advice for evacua-
tion and peace?" The direct issue of war or peace was up to him to de-
cide. Lincoln might have considered, as Jefferson Davis pointed out,
that the ultimate question for history would be: "Who offered the first
aggression, who first indicated the purpose of hostility?"
LINCOLN CALLS FOR TROOPS 55
On that Sunday of the Federal garrison's departure from Sumter,
President Davis attended the morning prayer service at St. John's and
heard the young Northern-born rector pray for the President of the
Confederate States, as was being done now in all the Episcopal
churches throughout the new nation. Naturally unaware of certain
facts and subtleties concerned with Seward's manipulations, Davis
had need to relieve his packed heart of bitterness as well as to give
thanks for the miracle of deliverance without bloodshed and to pray
for peace.
Though the Confederate President felt no elation of triumph him-
self, all Sunday afternoon and evening he was receiving reports of the
South's glowing reaction to the Sumter victory. Charleston churches
held special thanksgiving services to which the unregenerate as well
as the faithful flocked. In the Catholic Cathedral, Te Deums were
sung with swelling voices. At St. MichaeFs the Episcopal rector sol-
emnly told his congregation that "this signal and bloodless victory was
due to the infinite mercy of God, who interposed His hand in behalf
of our righteous cause."
From the Atlantic Coast to the plains of western Texas the South
manifested joy. Dispatches proclaimed that Southerners were willing
to endure any sacrifices to be free of "the oppressive, insulting North."
"No more to pay duties to enrich New England industrialists at South-
ern expense," an editor exulted, "and to pour tax money into Washing-
ton's treasury!" Many Southerners felt, as Dr. E. Merton Coulter put
it, "A new nation would give the South a chance to profit from its own
wealth and prevent the North from siphoning away an estimated
$100,000,000 annually." A mighty hope surged through the Confeder-
ate States.
Since no Union soldier had been killed by Confederate shot, Jeffer-
son Davis may have had a flashing vision that the newborn nation
could yet achieve a peaceful fruition. "Firing on the flag" of the Star
of the West in January had been more or less accepted by the North
as an accompaniment of secession. No hint of war followed. As Wil-
liam Russell was shortly to write the London Times, "It is absurd to
assert . . . that the sudden outburst when Fort Sumter was fired upon
was caused by the insult to the flag. Why, the flag had been fired on
long before Sumter was attacked ... it had been torn down from the
United States arsenals and forts all over the South. . . . Secession
was an accomplished fact months before Lincoln came into office. . . .
.The North was perfectly quiescent. . . . New York was then engaged
56 JEFFERSON DAVIS
in discussing States' Rights and in reading articles to prove that the
New Government would be traitors if they endeavored to reinforce the
Federal forts."
Through that Sunday night of April 14, while Southerners cele-
brated and Northerners gathered in indignation meetings, men of good
will on both sides prayed that a war between brothers might be
avoided. The next day, April 15, the verdict ran hotly over the nation's
telegraph wires. President Lincoln had called for 75,000 volunteers.
Lincoln's actual call for troops stunned a large part of the North as
well as the South. To Jefferson Davis it was a sickening blow, and
something of a surprise, since the United States Congress was not in
session. Davis, who knew the Constitution of the United States by
heart, was quite aware of President Lincoln's usurpation of power. The
Constitution clearly read: "The Congress shall have power to provide
for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the Union, suppress
insurrections, and repel invasions." No such power was vested in the
Chief Executive. In his proclamation, Lincoln dug back to an idea of
the 1787 Federal Convention. He declared "the laws of the United
States are opposed and the execution thereof obstructed ... by com-
binations too powerful to be suppressed by the ordinary course of
judicial proceeding." He commanded "the combinations aforesaid to
disperse."
As Davis ironically said to his Cabinet: "It can but surprise any-
one in the least degree conversant with the history of the Union, to
find States referred to as 'persons composing combinations' and that
the sovereign creators of the Federal Government, the States of the
Union, should be commanded by their agent to disperse."
In America's greatest crisis, Davis noted that Lincoln had no desire
for the help of Congress, either immediately or for the next eighty
days; he had asked Congress to convene in extraordinary session "at
12 o'clock noon, on Thursday, the fourth of July next." Apparently
Mr. Lincoln did not want the constituted lawmakers to interfere with
an assumption of authority he did not legally possess. To Davis, it
seemed an indication of Lincoln's determination to rule as long as pos-
sible as a dictator.
Jefferson Davis himself was not troubled by the question that has
worried subsequent generations. "The question," as Dr. Coulter put
it, "is whether Lincoln was a marplot and bungler or a cunning villain
and provocateur; whether he stumbled into war at Sumter or whether
he planned it." Did Mr. Lincoln get caught "in his own web of con-
LINCOLN CALLS FOR TROOPS 57
fusion," as some historians suggest? Did he blunder into a war he did
not want? Without knowledge that Lincoln had said privately just
after his election, "If the tug has to come, better now than later,"
Davis believed the President of the United States had deliberately ma-
neuvered a war. Later, Lincoln's own devoted private secretaries, John
G. Nicolay and John Hay, seemed to agree with Davis's view. In Dr.
Robert McElroy's opinion, these collaborative biographers put the
responsibility on President Lincoln "by arguing that his aim in the
Fort Sumter Expedition was to tempt the Confederates to fire upon
the flag, and then become the aggressors in a conflict which he felt to
be inevitable."
In dealing with the Confederacy, Lincoln had to contend with a
united people. Since he did not have a united North behind him, he
felt that his main chance for unifying his people lay in "showing firm-
ness" by asserting national authority in the harbor of Charleston.
After his call for volunteers, President Lincoln sent a consoling, if
cryptic, letter to the disappointed Captain Fox on his failure to supply
Sumter. "You and I," he wrote, "both anticipated the course of the
country would be advanced by making the attempt to provision Fort
Sumter, even if it should fail, and it is no small consolation now to feel
that our anticipation is justified by the result." 5 The immediate result
was a political victory for Lincoln himself, to be followed by the loss
of four more States to the Confederacy. Jefferson Davis regarded Lin-
coln's call for troops much as did the London Times, which was to ex-
claim: "What a spectacle is here! A government going to war for no
principle, for no object, save that of aggrandizement."
All the morning of April i6 } President Davis was closeted with his
Cabinet. That afternoon he issued a proclamation asking for 32,000 of
the 100,000 volunteers Congress had already authorized in case the
North became coercive. This number was all the government currently
had arms for.
The hope of those Southerners who had entertained a lingering be-
lief that they might again become members of the Union perished with
Lincoln's warlike act, which made the fracture complete. Even the
most wishful were convinced that reunion was now an impossibility.
Despite all arguments and warnings, Mr. Lincoln had apparently lit-
tle understanding of the Southern temper if he thought the Confed-
eracy was bluffing. The Montgomery Evening Mail bespoke the gen-
6 Lincoln's letter is significantly quoted in both Samuel W. Crawford's Genesis of the
Civil War and Avery 0. Craven's The Coming of the Civil War.
58 JEFFERSON DAVIS
eral attitude when it declared: "To advocate a political reunion with
the North is to advocate the basest kind of treason." Jefferson Davis
saw eager volunteers pouring into the Southern capital by railway cars
and in farm wagons, on thoroughbreds and on mules. And many a rural
fellow, with his "hunting piece" across his shoulder, arrived afoot.
CHAPTER V
LEE'S CHOICE
WILLIAM HOWARD RUSSELL, correspondent of the London
Times, had set out from Washington for Charleston just as reduction
of Sumter got under way. Two days later, he saw Confederate flags
flying all over North Carolina, which was still in the Union. As the
train passed, "men, women and children, of all colours, whooped and
yelled vehemently," and at each stop the engineer would holler, "Hur-
rah for Jeff Davis 1 " Nowhere along the route could Russell discern a
sign of the affection for the Union that Seward had assured him
"underlay the Secession proclivities."
In Charleston, Russell noted the streets were "crowded with lanky
lads, clanking spurs, and sabres, with awkward squads marching to
and fro, with drummers beating calls, and ruffles, and points of war,
around them groups of grinning negroes delighted with the glare and
glitter, a holiday, and a new idea for them secession flags waving out
of all the windows." He wrote in his diary: "The streets of Charleston
present some such aspect as those of Paris in the last revolution.
Crowds of armed men singing and promenading the streets, the battle
blood running through their veins that hot oxygen which is called
'the flush of victory' on the cheek. . . . Sumter has set them dis-
traught; never such a victory. It is a bloodless Waterloo."
Russell visited the half-demolished fort, met General Beauregard,
Governor Pickens, the Wigfalls, the Chesnuts, almost everybody of
importance, and many rich young privates from aristocratic families.
"With all his faults and provincialism," he observed, "your true Caro-
linian is as charming and fascinating a being as one ever encountered."
While Russell was observing in Charleston, Jefferson Davis's atten-
59
60 JEFFERSON DAVIS
tion was riveted on Virginia. Had Roger Pry or been right? The day
after Lincoln's clarion call, a body of responsible Richmond citizens
organized a Spontaneous People's Convention to spur immediate ac-
tion. Though a grandson of Patrick Henry cautioned moderation, he
was followed by a flood of impassioned speeches demanding with-
drawal.
On April 17, the Virginia Convention adopted an Ordinance of Se-
cession by a final vote of 103 to 46 to be made binding when ap-
proved by the people. 1 "The announcement/' noted Mrs. Pryor, who
was in Richmond, "was followed by a thrilling moment of silence, suc-
ceeded by tears of gladness and deafening shouts of applause. Old ex-
President Tyler made a stirring address: ' Generations yet unborn,'
he avouched, 'would bless those who had the high privilege of partici-
pation in the present struggle.' " Thousands of Richmonders, "frantic
with delight," marched to the capitol, while the Fayette Artillery tri-
umphantly fired a hundred-gun salute. "As if by magic," wrote an-
other eyewitness, "a new flag, the symbol of the Southern Confederacy,
appeared on the Capitol, appeared on all the hills of Richmond, in the
windows of houses, in the hands of passengers on the street."
On the seventeenth, in Montgomery, when summer was daily ex-
pected, wintry weather unseasonably gripped the town. The President
had to get out his overcoat. In the Executive Offices, fires were blazing
when he arrived. In the afternoon came the warming news of Virginia's
secession. Davis's spirits rose immeasurably. Nothing could add such
prestige and moral strength to the infant nation as the addition of Vir-
ginia. Mr. Lincoln's call for troops had presented the Confederacy with
the "Mother of States," which had bred four of the first five Presidents
Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe together with John Mar-
shall and a host of other distinguished names. As cannon salutes
honored the glad tidings in Montgomery, the townsfolk responded
with delirious shouts.
The Confederate President was hardly prepared for the exultant en-
thusiasm Virginia's citizens manifested. In Petersburg, he learned,
three hundred free Negroes promptly offered their services "either to
fight under white officers or to ditch and dig." In answer to a Northern
friend's question, "What will the Union men of Virginia do now?,"
John J. Baldwin, Union leader of the Convention, replied: "We have
no Union men in Virginia now; those who were 'union' men will stand
*The negative vote came largely from representatives of the rugged western counties.
LEE'S CHOICE 61
to their guns and make a fight which will stand out on the page of his-
tory." 2
Although the plebiscite to make secession legal was not scheduled
until late May, President Davis lost no time in sending Alexander
Stephens to Richmond to seek an offensive and defensive alliance with
Virginia. The Vice-President left Montgomery on April 19.
The very next day, Virginia's Colonel Robert E. Lee, to whom Gen-
eral Scott had just offered the command of all the Union forces to be
brought into the field, tendered his resignation. From his estate, Arling-
ton, across the Potomac and in sight of the Capitol, Lee wrote to Vir-
ginia-born Scott. He explained that his resignation would have been
presented at once, "but for the struggle it has caused me to separate
myself from service to which I have devoted the best years of my life,
and all the ability I possessed. . . . Save in defense of my native
state/' he ended his letter, "I desire never again to draw my sword."
Jefferson Davis was profoundly gratified by Lee's rejection of the
gift of the Federal high command. But he had expected his resignation,
though he understood what special sacrifices were involved, among
them the likely loss of Arlington, his wife's beloved and valuable in-
heritance. To his intimates, Davis remarked: "Anyone who knew Lee
could have foretold what his choice would be."
For the Confederacy, it was a glorious decision. Robert E. Lee had
not waited until the Ordinance of Secession had been submitted to the
people of Virginia; he had resigned when offered the leadership of
coercing the South. Davis had an excellent answer to the North's
charge that Lee acted from ambition when he left the service of the
United States. "With a small part of Lee's knowledge of the relative
amount of material possessed by the North and the South," he wrote,
"anyone must have seen that the chances of war were against us. ...
Alone he rode forth, his guiding star being Duty, and offered his sword
to Virginia."
The Virginia Convention promptly made Lee head of the Council
of War and conferred on him the commission of Major General. The
same day that he reached Richmond, a taciturn teacher of mathemat-
ics, with rough-hewn features and a dark rust-colored beard, arrived
with a corps of cadets from the Virginia Military Institute. Thirty-
a Baldwin overstated the case. The people of mountainous northwestern Virginia, whose
economic interests wre largely dependent on tfce Ohio River ? remained loyal to the
tJnion,
62 JEFFERSON DAVIS
seven-year-old Thomas J. Jackson had resigned his professorship at
Lexington; and, now appearing in an old Mexican War uniform, he
offered his West Point training and his fighting arm to Virginia's de-
fense. Lee sent him to command at strategic Harpers Ferry.
On invitation, General Lee came to call on Jefferson Davis's emis-
sary, Vice-President Stephens, at the Ballard Hotel. Lee desired an
immediate alliance between Virginia and the Confederacy. Generously,
he declared he was entirely willing to put his services and those of Vir-
ginia's officers under the Confederate Government and "be ruled
by it."
On April 24, former President John Tyler, head of the Virginia com-
mittee, and Vice-President Stephens signed a temporary "convention"
placing Virginia's military forces "under the chief control and direc-
tion of the President of the Confederate States." General Lee straight-
way began preparing his state's defenses and readying volunteers for
effective service.
On his return to Montgomery, Stephens, who had resented making
the journey to Richmond and "thought little enough of Lee anyhow,"
gave Jefferson Davis a rhapsodic account of his capitulation to the
man's qualities. "He stood there, fresh and ruddy as a David from the
sheepfold in the prime of his manly beauty. ... I had before me the
most manly man and entire gentleman I ever saw." While Lee sat in
Stephens's room at the Ballard, the Vice-President became convinced
"that his seeming modesty was genuine, that this worth, which his
compatriots believed, was real, that his character was utterly unself-
ish." Stephens confessed that when he took Lee's hand in parting that
night he had feelings of "almost reverence."
The following week, President Davis received reports that General
Lee was working with driving energy against May 5, the date Mr. Lin-
coln had set for "the dispersion" of the secessionists. Patriotism so
flowered in Virginia that the recruiting stations could hardly handle
the volunteers, and for lack of arms Lee had to send home youths
under eighteen. Among the few like the realistic Jefferson Davis,
R. E. Lee predicted a prolonged conflict. A week after he had set about
preparing defenses, he wrote his wife: "The war may last ten years."
Lee had a tremendous task, as Davis understood, for Richmond,
only a hundred miles from Washington, might be threatened at three
particular points, each more than a hundred and fifty miles from the
other: from the Peninsula and Fortress Monroe, which remained in
Union hands; from Harpers Ferry, in northwestern Virginia; and from
LEE'S CHOICE 63
Manassas Junction, about thirty miles south of Washington. No direct
railway connections linked one region with another, and the state's
country roads certainly could not be called good.
Although Virginia's pro-Union Governor John Letcher rebukingly
wrote President Lincoln, "You have chosen to inaugurate civil war,"
he had exasperated importunate Virginians weeks before by refusing
to send state troops to capture Fortress Monroe, the Norfolk Navy
Yard, and Harpers Ferry, when almost all the other strongholds below
Mason and Dixon's line were changing hands.
Now, following the Virginia Convention's vote for secession, the
Federal commander of the Harpers Ferry arsenal acted with celerity.
He applied the torch to the buildings, and evacuated, leaving a state
of destruction, including the complete ruination of 15,000 stands of
arms. The shipyard at Norfolk was abandoned by Union forces to the
accompaniment of another devastating fire, which destroyed valuable
engines and a vast amount of machinery. Besides, the Federals burned
their large ship Pennsylvania, and sank six others, including the frigate
Merrimac, later to be salvaged by the Confederates and, as a rearmed
ironclad, named the Virginia.
Jefferson Davis was impressed on hearing of Colonel Thomas Jack-
son's first bold action at Harpers Ferry. Jackson had temporarily cut
the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad line, which connected the West with
Washington, and "diverted" a quantity of sorely needed rolling stock
to other lines in Virginia.
President Davis had constant assurances that the Southerners
would not shrink from the sacrifices they would be called upon to make
for independence. Men of every economic and social category were de-
termined to defend their homes. Aside from endearing old Judge Peti-
gru in Charleston, there seemed to be only two outstanding men in the
South eager to use their influence for the Union. One was Davis's
enemy Senator Andrew Johnson of Tennessee, who hated all planters
and aristocrats. The other was his admirer of younger days, aging Sam
Houston, who decried the folly of believing in the ultimate success of
the seceded states. But Houston was renounced wholesale by his once
idolizing Texans. He was deposed as governor, and saw his own be-
loved son put on a Confederate uniform. Senator Johnson was badly
mauled at Lynchburg by angry Virginians while passing from Wash-
ington to his home in eastern Tennessee. In the cars, "the enemy of
Southern ways" had his nose pulled literally and viciously. Only the
64 JEFFERSON DAVIS
passengers saved him from being ignominiously dragged out to the
platform where, according to the papers, a "large crowd groaned him
and offered him every indignity he deserved.' 7
With intense interest, Jefferson Davis watched every dispatch and
comment on the reactions of the Border States. If, he reflected, the
upper South from Maryland through Missouri would join the lower
South, this more even balance in the opposing line-ups might forestall
war. The bitter replies of Border State Governors to Lincoln's call
for volunteers were more than reassuring. In an outburst of indigna-
tion, Governor John W. Ellis of North Carolina informed the President
of the United States that he would furnish no troops and would not
be a party "to this wicked violation of the laws of the country, and to
this war upon the liberties of a free people." He put teeth into his re-
fusal by seizing the arsenal at Fayetteville and three Federal forts
within the state's boundaries.
Tennessee's Governor, Isham G. Harris, advised Lincoln that he
would not furnish one man for the purposes of coercion, "but 50,000,
if necessary, for the defense of our rights, and those of our Southern
brothers." Henry M. Rector, Governor of Arkansas, showed his re-
sentment by adding insult: "The people of this Commonwealth are
freemen, not slaves, and will defend to the last extremity, their honor,
lives and property against Northern mendacity and usurpation." He
promptly possessed the United States military stores at Napoleon,
Arkansas.
Jefferson Davis had expected considerable caution on the part of
Kentucky, Missouri, and Maryland, which directly bordered anti-
slavery states. He knew that a choice would be hard to make, because
if the likely war came, their soil might logically become the chief bat-
tlegrounds.
Governor Beriah Magoffin of Kentucky wrote Lincoln rather
sharply: "I say, emphatically, Kentucky will furnish no troops for the
wicked purpose of subduing her sister Southern States." Missouri's
Governor, Claiborne F. Jackson, who openly advocated secession, sent
Lincoln the most stinging rebuke of all: "Your requisition is illegal,
unconstitutional, revolutionary, inhuman, diabolical, and cannot be
complied with."
Davis was particularly concerned about Maryland, for that strategic
state was regarded somewhat as the South's outpost. Though the East-
ern Shore people and those in Baltimore were Southern in sentiment,
the western counties were largely pro-Union. So Maryland's Cover-
LEE'S CHOICE 63
nor Thomas H. Hicks assumed a neutral role. On April 18, he issued a
proclamation urging the citizens to preserve peace, and assured them
that no troops would be sent out of Maryland, "unless in defense of
the national capital/' which stood on soil that had been ceded by
Maryland.
The next day, however, when the Sixth Massachusetts Volunteers
arrived at the railroad station in Baltimore, an angry mob disputed
their passage through the city to a connecting train. Baltimoreans at-
tacked the soldiers with paving stones picked up in a street that was
under construction. The surprised young men in uniform started firing
without orders. Some determined citizens wrenched muskets from the
volunteers and turned their weapons against them. The city militia
was called out to restore order. Four soldiers and nine Baltimoreans
lay dead. More than a hundred persons were wounded, some seri-
ously. 3 Guarded by the police, those soldiers who had fought their way
through the city took the Southern Railroad for Washington. But, by
the Governor's orders, the rear portion of the regiment was sent back
to Maryland's northern border.
Mayor George William Brown of Baltimore dispatched three gen-
tlemen by express train to President Lincoln a to explain fully the fear~
ful condition of affairs in this city.' 3 In his protesting note, he said:
"The people are exasperated to the highest degree by the passage of
troops, and the citizens are universally decided in the opinion that no
more should be ordered to come. ... It is my solemn duty to inform
you that it is not possible for more soldiers to pass through Baltimore
unless they fight their way at every step."
The next day, Maryland citizens began burning their railroad
bridges. The President of the Pennsylvania Central Railroad wrote a
frantic letter to Secretary of War Cameron that "the Baltimoreans and
Mary landers have destroyed the whole of the bridges on the Northern
Central. This seems to have been a mere spite action and must con-
vince the Government that those loyal to the Government are in vast
minority."
That same day, however, as Jefferson Davis learned, Major General
Benjamin F. Butler, in command of the Third Massachusetts Volun-
teer Militia, seized the capital, Annapolis, as well as the Elk Ridge
Railroad. On April 27, directed by President Lincoln, General Scott
announced the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus in Maryland,
to the utter astonishment of Chief Justice Taney, who declared "he
'Rhodes says 362 suffered wounds; Nicolay and Hay put the number at 118.
66 JEFFERSON DAVIS
could not find a shred of legality for the act." A few days later, Butler
took possession of Relay House, the railway junction nine miles from
Baltimore. As quickly as possible, to prevent the secession of Mary-
land, which would put Washington within the Confederacy's borders,
Lincoln strengthened key points with Federal troops. Then Butler
began clamping in jail prominent citizens of Confederate sympathies,
including members of the State Legislature. Almost before the state
knew what was happening, she found herself in the grip of military
occupation. Thousands of Marylanders began refugeeing to Virginia.
On April 27, President Lincoln issued a second proclamation of
blockade. Lincoln's act was a violation of the Constitution: he had no
right to declare a blockade of ports in states that he claimed were still
in the Union; and, if out of the Union, a blockade was an act of war,
which only Congress could decree. Jefferson Davis hoped this blockad-
ing move would spur England's quick recognition of the Confederacy.
In the meantime, as a counterstroke to the paper blockade, he issued a
proclamation offering letters of marque and reprisal to any private ves-
sel that would arm herself and, while under the Confederate flag, at-
tack Federal shipping.
CHAPTER VI
"THE HEART AND BRAINS OF
THE GOVERNMENT" AT HOME
AND AT OFFICE
THOUGH Jefferson Davis had been without his wife's comforting
ministrations during the Sumter engagement, she had returned on
the Sunday Major Anderson was allowed to depart with salutes to his
flag. When the President's Lady arrived on the river boat King, she
herself was honored with a salute of seven guns. The President met
her and the children at the landing and drove them straightway to the
Presidential mansion, which had been redecorated according to her
wishes during her absence. Soon she was directing the unpacking of
barrels and crates from Brierfield: silver and china, special linens,
lamps, pictures, a few favorite books. Varina had brought a couple of
her good colored servants from the plantation, and in New Orleans she
had hired a French chef for the official entertaining. She had also had
several dresses made for herself and for Margaret Howell, her "pale,
pretty, svelte, and witty ?y young sister, who was to stay with the
Davises, as she had in Washington.
To be settled in a commodious house with his affectionate family
about him was the best possible medicine for the overworked Presi-
dent, who had undergone heart-gripping trials the past fortnight. The
unpalatable meals at the Exchange, which everybody damned, were
hard on the toughest man's digestion. Now Varina was here to see that
her uncomplaining husband got the simple, well-prepared food he
needed. The cook from Brierfield knew exactly how he liked his corn
bread, and three times a day, regardless of what tempting dishes the
chef might prepare. Davis had often remarked that his Winnie's talent
for making people comfortable amounted almost to genius, and that
67
68 JEFFERSON DAVIS
she was at her best when people were troubled in body or mind. It was
cheering now to feel her expansive warmth, to have someone to talk to
intimately, to "let down" before. He liked to see the three children
playing about the fenced-in garden when he left for his office in the
morning and eagerly awaiting his return in the late evening. Next to a
sea voyage, Jefferson Davis found the companionship of his children
the best prescription for taking his mind off the burdens and irritations
of official business. The youngsters' delight in his presence rarely
failed to give him temporary relief from care.
Entertaining, the President conceded, was part of a chief executive's
job, and he greeted his good fortune in having a wife schooled in social
graces. Not only was Varina an instinctive hostess, but she had been
through the diplomatic mill in Washington, had seen the game played,
had herself enjoyed a leading role. A thoroughbred, with a sense of
humor but without frivolity, Varina knew how to turn on charm. A
born conversationalist, she was what was known in the South as "ex-
cellent company." Trained by her old Massachusetts tutor, Judge
George Winchester, and by her husband, she could talk men's talk
with the best of them. Davis knew that his wife possessed political
acumen as well as sound knowledge, though he often had to caution
her about the sharpness of her repartee, which sometimes made en-
emies.
In that critical April, though the President was too pressed to accept
invitations, the Davises gave several small dinners in their new home.
Sometimes Mr. Davis would relax completely and be in top form. "He
was exceedingly appreciative of wit,' 3 Mary Sidney Lanier commented,
"and at his own parties he was much given to telling amusing anec-
dotes, which he did admirably well. The President would have the
guests in a complete state of merriment without a show of a smile on
his face, which added to our convulsed state."
When Mrs. Davis gave her first general reception, her husband was
too busy at the last hour to receive with her. She was very dis-
appointed, but she induced him to notice the arrangements of hundreds
of cultivated roses sent in, according to Southern custom, by friends.
The six downstairs rooms and the reception hall were aglow with pink,
red, and yellow roses, and the banisters of the staircase were entwined
with white Cherokee roses that grew wild in the countryside. For the
occasion, Varina wore a gown designed by Olympe of New Orleans.
It was a smart and elegant creation of h^avy white silk with a fine hair
THE HEART AND BRAINS OF THE GOVERNMENT" . . . 69
stripe of black and scattered pink rosebuds woven into the material. 1
Though Varina's girlish slimness was gone now at thirty-five, and her
figure verged on the matronly, the added weight, her husband thought,
enhanced her natural regal bearing. His First Lady was indubitably a
handsome and distinguished-looking woman, and the President had
reason to be proud of her.
As he kissed her good-by, he knew that she would carry off the re-
ception in fine style without him. And he was convinced that she had
too much plain sense to have her head turned because people were call-
ing her "Queen Varina" behind her back some in admiration and
some in jealousy, with a soupgon of mockery.
The success of Mrs. Davis's first reception, however, was somewhat
marred by "vague, dismal news." "Men from Washington," Mary
Chesnut wrote, rushed in "with white lips crying 'Danger. Danger!' "
Several harped on the vast superiority of the enemy's men and re-
sources. Vice-President Stephens was in a particularly gloomy mood.
Mrs. Chesnut gave him a friendly rebuke for being obsessed "with
fears of the future instead of exultation at the success at Sumter and
the withdrawal of Virginia." She called him "half-hearted," and ac-
cused him of looking back. "The women," she declared stoutly, "had
no intention of becoming pillars of salt."
No matter how disturbed the President himself might be, he almost
never showed discouragement in public. But on one occasion, the
beautiful Mrs. Fitzpatrick, who had poked him with her parasol after
his inauguration, resented his telling her candidly that the Confeder-
acy had to prepare for a long war and "perhaps unmerciful reverses at
first." Mrs. Chesnut, however, invariably found him good company.
After one of the Davises' intimate dinners, she wrote in her diary:
"Dined at the President's and never had a pleasanter day. He is as
witty as he is wise. He was very agreeable; took me in to dinner. The
talk was of Washington; nothing of our present difficulties."
As the Chief Executive was often unable to attend scheduled social
affairs at the last minute, so he was unpredictable about bringing home
unexpected dinner guests. One day, to his wife's near consternation,
he brought, without warning, sixteen gentlemen for a two o'clock din-
ner. Mrs. Davis sent servants galloping on horseback to this place and
1 Intimate details in this section were given by Mrs. Davis to her dose friend Mrs.
Caroline Phelan Beale in New York in 1906. Original manuscript notes are in possession
of the author.
7O JEFFERSON DAVIS
that for special supplies, and before long had ready "a very creditable
dinner." This particular day, as it turned out, the President's mind
was so preoccupied with critical matters that he hardly spoke, and his
wife had to muster her resources to keep the entire company enter-
tained.
Davis was somewhat concerned when the carriage his wife had se-
lected in New Orleans finally arrived by river boat. It was a very hand-
some affair indeed, and costly. But Varina, who had far more worldly
sense than her husband, felt that no commonplace vehicle should
transport the President or his Lady on public thoroughfares. She had
ordered it, however, before Mr. Lincoln's call for troops. According to
the newspapers, the equipage was of great distinction, in fact, "the
most splendid piece of workmanship" ever received by Messrs. R.
Marsh, Denham and Co. of New Orleans from their manufactory in
New Jersey. A French caliche in design, the vehicle was upholstered
in "rich mazarine blue silk rep and had handsome mountings of prin-
cess metal." "The cal&che" declared the New Orleans Picayune,
"cannot fail to be greatly admired at Montgomery, and would be re-
marked anywhere in Hyde Park or the Bois de Boulogne." Though
it was called "the President's carriage," only on the rarest occasions
did Mr. Davis himself ever ride in it. He walked to his office; and for
diversion, he rode horseback. With his military bearing and simple
tastes, he found a spirited mount far more congenial than luxurious
carriage cushions.
As April 29 approached, the date President Davis had set for a spe-
cial "self-defense session" of the Confederate Congress, dignitaries
and hopeful hangers-on began arriving by every train. The James
Chesnuts returned on the cars from Charleston with Robert Barnwell,
South Carolina's revered citizen, whom the President had wanted for
his Secretary of State. The Wigfalls arrived and were house guests of
the Davises. Wigfall, according to Mrs. Chesnut, was "black with
rage" at Anderson's account of the fall of Sumter given to the Northern
papers. "Catch me risking my life to save him again," Wigfall sput-
tered. "He might have been man enough to tell those New Yorkers the
truth, however unpalatable to them a good word for us might have
been. We did behave well to him. The only men of his killed, he killed
himself, as they killed themselves, firing a salute to their old striped
flag."
Davis often winced at the irreverent way Wigfall spoke of things.
THE HEART AND BRAINS OF THE GOVERNMENT ... 7!
And perhaps Bob Anderson had been misquoted. Charleston had cer-
tainly been generous to him; up to the last six weeks of his stay, it had
supplied him with delicacies, besides showing him every courtesy. Now
this good man, who had caused the original trouble by moving on his
own hook from Moultrie to Sumter, was being sent to Kentucky by
Mr. Lincoln to restrain the state from joining the Confederacy. But
Davis was unceasingly grateful to Wigfall for his unauthorized act,
which probably saved Anderson's life as well as the lives of other Fed-
eral soldiers.
The friendship of Davis and Wigfall seemed odd to their mutual
friends. Few personalities could have been more markedly different.
About the only traits they had in common were patriotic devotion and
a kind of genius for extemporary eloquence. Wigfall had been feared
by Congressional opponents in debate for the bitterness of his sarcasm.
He could damnify and enrage with acid taunts, and frighten by his
fierce readiness for a fight with fists or weapons. Physically, the con-
trast between the men was extraordinary: Wigfall was powerfully
built, while Davis was rather ascetically slender. In literary encaustic,
William Russell limned a most vivid portrait of Louis Wigfall:
"His face was not one to be forgotten a straight broad brow, from
which the hair rose up like vegetation on a riverbank, beetling black
brows a mouth coarse and grim, yet full of power, a square jaw a
thick argumentative nose a new growth of scrubbly beard and mous-
tache these were relieved by eyes of wonderful depth and light, such
as I never saw before but in the head of a wild beast. If you look some
day . . . into the eyes of a Bengal Tiger . . . you will form some
notion of the expression I mean."
Davis and Wigfall so complemented each other that the very dif-
ferences may have bred the attraction between them. But such a
friendship could hardly be harmonious forever. When, however, Con-
gress convened on April 29, Wigfall was in complete accord with the
President, as was virtually the entire Southern body politic, except
for a handful of chronic malcontents like Charleston's R. B. Rhett.
In his address to Congress, Jefferson Davis pronounced Mr. Lin-
coln's call for volunteers u a plain declaration of war, which I am not
at liberty to disregard, because of my knowledge that under the Con-
stitution of the United States the President is usurping a power granted
exclusively to Congress." Nineteen thousand Confederate troops, he
said, were now in the field protecting the various Southern forts, while
16,000 more were on their way to Virginia's defense. After a summary
72 JEFFERSON DAVIS
of the internal affairs of the government and the necessity for raising
funds to defray the expenses of maintaining independence, he closed
his message with words intended especially for Northern ears:
We protest solemnly in the face of mankind, that we desire peace at any
sacrifice, save that of honor. In independence we seek no conquest, no
aggrandizement, no concession of any kind from the States with which we have
lately been confederated. All we ask is to be let alone that those who never
held power over us shall not now attempt our subjugation by arms. This we
will, we must, resist to the direst extremity. The moment that this pre-
tension is abandoned, the sword will drop from our grasp, and we shall be
ready to enter into treaties of amnesty and commerce that cannot but be
mutually beneficial. So long as this pretension is maintained, with a firm
reliance on that Divine Power which covers with its protection the just cause,
we must continue to struggle for our inherent right to freedom, independence,
and self government.
Davis's message pleased Congress, and in accordance with his de-
sires, it promptly passed acts authorizing the President to use the
whole land and naval force to meet the necessities of defense, and to
issue letters of marque to armed private vessels, which, in the emer-
gency, he had already done. He was empowered to make a loan of fifty
million dollars in bonds and notes. An act was passed to provide
revenue from imports.
This first Confederate Provisional Congress was made up of good
material, and its members worked harmoniously with the President.
"It is certain," one correspondent wrote, "that Mr. Davis is the heart
and brains of the Government and his popularity with the people is,
at this time, unbounded.' 3
After spending a fortnight in and about Charleston, visiting planta-
tions and being entertained with traditional Southern hospitality,
William Russell started for the Confederate capital to meet President
Davis. Like Mr. Lincoln's confidant, Ward Lamon, the Londoner
had met only one Unionist in all South Carolina: pleasant, witty Judge
Petigru, "the sole specimen of the genus/' affectionately tolerated be-
cause of his rarity. Across Georgia, Russell beheld the Stars and Bars
flying from pine tops as well as at road stations, and heard continual
lusty cheers for Jeff Davis. At Macon he saw Georgia volunteers flock-
ing into the cars to go to Virginia's defense. At another railway junc-
tion he was joined by General Beauregard, who was on his way to re-
port to the President. The Creole was in top spirits, but tired of the
THE HEART AND BRAINS OF THE GOVERNMENT ... 73
speechmaking clamored for at every stop "the price of a hero/' he
sighed.
In Montgomery, where Russell had to sleep at the jampacked Ex-
change with six in a room, he happily fell into the hands of the super-
charged Louis Wigfall, whom he had earlier met in Charleston and
who was now a kind of aide to the President. Wigfall undertook to be
his guide and sponsor.
Russell was particularly eager to meet Jefferson Davis. Seward had
told him Davis was the only man with "the brain, the courage and the
dexterity" to bring the "Secession plot 3 ' to a successful issue. Russell
had already discovered that "all persons in the Southern States spoke
of Davis with admiration. 33
Russell, accustomed to the grand chancelleries and imposing formal-
ities of European courts, was unprepared for the democratic plain-
ness of the corner brick building sometimes called "Jeff Davis's State
Department." On the second floor, the door on which was written "The
President" stood open. Wigfall walked in directly and returned, an-
nouncing "The President will be glad to see you; walk in, sir." Mr.
Davis was engaged with four gentlemen, who were making him offers
of aid. Thanking his visitors "in the name of the Government," the
President shook hands with each and bowed them out. Then turning
to the correspondent, he said with a smile, "Mr. Russell, I am glad to
welcome you here, though I fear your appearance is a symptom that
our affairs are not quite prosperous."
He invited his caller to sit close to his own chair at his office table,
and then proceeded to talk of the Crimean War, to which, as Secretary
of War, he had sent three observers, among them young George B.
McClellan. He spoke of the deserved fame of Russell for the brilliance
of his reports on the Crimean campaigns. He asked questions about
Sevastopol and the siege of Lucknow.
While they conversed, Russell noted the simplicity of Mr. Davis's
clothes: "a rustic suit of slate-colored stuff, with a plain black silk
handkerchief about his neck." "I had an opportunity of observing the
President very closely," he wrote in his diary that night. "He did not
impress me as favorably as I had expected, though he is certainly a
very different looking man from Mr. Lincoln. He is like a gentleman."
With the strain of past months, Davis had grown quite thin, and
Russell found "the jaws too hollow to be handsome." "The lips are
thin, flexible and curved," he wrote, "the chin square, well-defined,
and the eyes deep set, large and full one seems nearly blind, and is
74 JEFFEKSON DAVIS
partly covered with a film, owing to excruciating attacks of neuralgia."
Though the expression of the face was somewhat careworn, "no trace
of anything but the utmost confidence and greatest decision could be
detected in his conversation."
In the course of their agreeable talk, Russell asked the President
for some sort of passport or protection in case he fell into the hands of
a guerrilla leader when he journeyed northward. Davis smilingly re-
assured him: "Sir, you are among civilized, intelligent people, who
understand your position and appreciate your character. We do not
seek the sympathy of England by unworthy means; for we respect
ourselves, and we are glad to invite the scrutiny of men into our acts.
As for our motives, we meet the eye of Heaven." There was nothing
self-righteous or sententious in the tone; the President was merely
stating his absolute conviction in the justice of the Southern cause.
Russell was surprised that during the entire conversation the Presi-
dent made no allusion whatever to the authorities in Washington. But
Davis wanted to know if Europe supposed there was really going to
be war? Russell replied that the public did not think there would be
actual hostilities. "And yet you see," Davis said quietly, "we are
driven to take up arms for the defense of our rights and liberties."
Noting the immense mass of papers on the table, Russell rose and
made his bow. The President accompanied him to the door. Giving him
his hand, he said graciously, "As long as you may stay among us you
shall receive every facility it is in our power to afford you, and I shall
always be glad to see you."
Outside, Wigfall was waiting to introduce Russell to various Cab-
inet members. When he was taken into the room marked "Secretary of
War," Russell found General Beauregard closeted with Leroy Walker.
They were both in fine humor, for unreleased news had just been re-
ceived that Arkansas and Tennessee had joined the Confederacy that
day, May 6. Beauregard was "measuring off miles of country with
his compass, as if he were dividing empires." "Is it not too bad," he
said, looking up at Russell, "these Yankees will not let us go our own
way, and keep their cursed Union to themselves?" Russell reflected:
"Mr. Seward could not have been more wrong. There was no love in
the South for the Union now."
The Secretary of War made little impression on the correspondent,
except for his tobacco chewing and his utter confidence in the Con-
federacy's speedy success. But Judah P. Benjamin, the short, stout,
"olive-coloured," bright-eyed, Jewish Attorney General, impressed
THE HEART AND BRAINS OF THE GOVERNMENT" ... 75
him forcibly. Russell found him "the most open, frank and cordial of
all the Confederates he had met," and brilliant as well Benjamin
seemed to have firm faith that Britain's cotton interests would bring
her to recognize the Confederate Government. "All this coyness about
acknowledging a slave power," he said affably, "will come right at last*
. . . We are quite easy in our minds on this point at present."
Benjamin was convinced that English authorities on law would ad-
vise the Federal Administration that the blockade of Southern ports
was illegal so long as the President claimed them to be ports of the
United States. "At present," he said assuredly, "their paper blockade
does no harm; the season for shipping cotton is over. But in October
next, when the Mississippi is floating cotton and all our wharves are
full, it is inevitable that the Yankees must come to trouble with this
attempt to coerce us."
Though the President himself had not mentioned cotton, Russell
informed the Times that the people in Montgomery "firmly believe
that the war will not last a year. They believe in the irresistible power
of Cotton to force England to intervene." He had found the same thing
in Charleston: "The doctrine of 'cotton is king' to them is a lively,
all powerful faith without distracting heresies or schisms."
On his way to Mrs. Davis's reception that afternoon, Russell passed
a company of volunteer artillerymen going to the station to entrain
for Virginia. The band was playing "Dixie," and "crowds of whites
and blacks of both sexes" followed, cheering vociferously.
When Russell was presented "in the 'demi-jour' of a moderately-
sized parlor," Mrs. Davis was surrounded by a few ladies and gentle-
men with whom "she seemed to be a great favorite." The Britisher
found her a "comely, sprightly woman ... of good figure and man-
ners, well-dressed, lady-like and clever." Though he knew she had
exerted considerable social influence in Washington and was now be-
ing compared to Queen Victoria, he noted no affectation whatever.
Mrs. Davis received him cordially with frank graciousness. She told
him that she had just heard that some Northern paper had offered a
reward for "the head of the arch rebel Jeff Davis." With a flash of
anger in her dark eyes, she said she believed they were quite capable
of such acts. When Russell made his adieus, Mrs. Davis invited him
to come some evening when her husband would be at home.
Two days later, as Russell was departing by river boat for Mobile,
he received an invitation to dine with the President. He was much
chagrined at being obliged to decline. But he felt he had to complete
76 JEFFERSON DAVIS
his Southern tour speedily, for he feared mail communication with the
North would soon be suspended and the blockade might cut off com-
munications by sea.
Among Russell's last diary entries from Montgomery was an obser-
vation like a summational opinion of his few weeks in the divided
land: "The North thinks that they can coerce the South and I am not
prepared to say they are right or wrong; but I am convinced that the
South can only be forced back by such a conquest as that which laid
Poland prostrate at the feet of Russia."
CHAPTER VII
LAST WEEKS IN MONTGOMERY
THE PRESIDENT'S authorization by Congress to use the naval force
was highly ironic at the time, because there was nothing in the South
that could be called a navy. But the Secretary of the Navy was by no
means idle. Davis had chosen the best equipped man in the Confeder-
acy for the job. In the United States Senate, Stephen R. Mallory had
headed the Committee on Naval Affairs. He was clear-sighted and
practical, with a sharp eye for details. And, in addition, he possessed
imagination, invention, and a high degree of initiative. Mallory and
Davis were continually in conference and generally in cordial agree-
ment.
On May 9, after perfecting their plans, the President instructed the
Secretary of the Navy to send James Dunwody Bulloch of Georgia 1
to England to purchase or build six steam-propelled vessels to be pre-
pared, if necessity arose, to prey on United States commerce. The next
day, on Mallory's recommendation, Congress appropriated a million
dollars for Bulloch's mission and voted an additional two millions for
the purchase or construction of two ironclads either in England or
France. Naval Lieutenant James H. North was forthwith com-
missioned to proceed to Europe to obtain the ironclads.
Mallory and Davis agreed that the possession of an iron-armored
ship was a matter of prime necessity. "Such a vessel at this time,"
Mallory optimistically told Congress, "could traverse the entire coast
of the United States, prevent all blockades, and encounter, with a fair
prospect of success, their entire navy."
1 Bulloch, uncle of Theodore Roosevelt and great-uncle of Eleanor Roosevelt* wrote
the comprehensive, two -volume Secret Service of the Confederate States in Europe,.
published in London in 1883.
77
78 JEFFERSON DAVIS
Correspondents soon began speaking of the length to which the
Congress would go to please Jefferson Davis. Often when a bill was
not framed to his liking, he would return it with suggestions for cor-
rections and emendations. At this second assemblage of the Confeder-
ate Congress, it was still believed that the entire Government was "in
the hollow of the President's hand" and that whatever measures the
Chief Executive recommended were good for the young republic.
"Congress," De Leon observed, "remained a formal body to pass bills
and ratify acts, the inspiration for which derived from the clearest and
coolest brain in the South."
However, there was one important matter in which the President
had not got his way: the period of enlistment. During February, the
belief had prevailed in the South that there would be no war, or, if
there were, that it would last only a brief time. The first bill that had
passed Congress provided for accepting troops for sixty days. The
President, divining more accurately the temper of the Federal Govern-
ment and foreseeing the probability of a long and bitter struggle, had
called in Francis Bartow, Chairman of the Committee on Military
Affairs, and urged him to persuade Congress to adopt a bill specify-
ing three-year enlistments. But Bartow had insisted that he would
do well if he could persuade the legislators to extend the period to
twelve months. On February 28, 1861, this new bill had become a law,
authorizing the President to receive volunteers "for not less than
twelve months, unless sooner discharged."
On May 17, the newly arrived war clerk, John Beauchamp Jones,
pro-Southern newspaper editor who had fled Philadelphia, was pre-
sented to the President. Jones, who was to become the most indefati-
gable diarist of the period, straightway set down his first impression
of Jefferson Davis in his journal.
He was overwhelmed with papers and retained a number in his left hand,
probably of more importance than the rest. He received me with urbanity,
and while he read the papers I had given him, as I had never seen him
before, I endeavored to scrutinize his features. . . . His stature is tall, nearly
six feet, his frame is very slight and seemingly frail, but when he throws
back his shoulders he is as straight as an Indian chief. The features of his
face are distinctly marked with character, and no one gazing at his profile
would doubt for a moment that he beheld more than an ordinary man. His
face is handsome, and on his thin lip often basks a pleasant smile.
About the time Jones was presented, Davis had just finished steer-
ing through Congress the measures for a complete military establish-
LAST WEEKS IN MONTGOMERY 79
ment, which had been complicated by the time element involved in
the transfer of soldiers and facilities from state to Confederate Gov-
ernment control.
While this complicated business was being implemented, Virginia's
Joseph E. Johnston arrived in Montgomery to get some new assignment
in the Confederate Army. Against his wife's desire, he had resigned
his commission as Quartermaster General in the United States Army
a few days after Lee had been made Commander in Chief of
Virginia's military and naval forces. Lee had promptly given him the
rank of Major General, and put him to instructing the troops assem-
bling at Richmond. But within a fortnight, Johnston was flabbergasted
when the Virginia Government reduced him to Brigadier General, on
the ground that only one man, Lee, should hold the higher rank. As
soon as he recovered from the shock, he went to Montgomery to put his
case directly to the Confederate President.
Davis knew that, while Johnston was valuable as a soldier, he was
at the same time extremely ambitious and touchy about his personal
dignity. Though as cadet mates at West Point they had been mere
acquaintances, in Washington during the past year their high-spirited
wives had been intimate friends. Johnston had been brought there for
special assignments by Secretary of War John B. Floyd, his cousin by
marriage. And in July, 1860, Floyd had named him Quartermaster
General. 2 There was some Congressional opposition and criticism
from officers who outranked Johnston, but Senator Jefferson Davis, as
chairman of the Committee on Military Affairs, had helped to get the
appointment confirmed.
Now, in Montgomery, Davis saw that the slightly built Johnston
carried his fifty-four years and his five feet eight inches as erect and
proud as in their cadet days at West Point, when he had something
of a gamecock swagger to his walk. His hair had grayed and was re-
ceding from his forehead, but his side whiskers and a well-groomed
tuft of beard gave his gravely handsome face distinction. Calm, de-
liberate, low-voiced, Johnston had a certain magnetism. Though one of
his friends considered him "critical, controversial and irritable by
nature/' he had the gift of winning subordinates. Aloof in manner, he
was yet an adroit politician in furthering his own position.
'Lee, who had outranked Johnston in the field, was according to Douglas Southall
Freeman, "stung" by what he considered Floyd's preferment of Johnston. Lee wrote his
son Custis that Johnston "has been advanced beyond anyone in the army and it has
thrown more discredit than ever on the system of favoritism and making brevets."
80 JEFFERSON DAVIS
Davis gathered that Johnston, who could not bear "to be beaten
even in a game of billiards/' was unhappy about having to take com-
mands in Virginia from his classmate Robert E. Lee, and that he de-
sired some high commission in the Confederate service. But since there
was no higher rank than Brigadier in the Confederate Army at this
time, he would have to content himself with that. Johnston's old friend
Adjutant General Samuel Cooper and the President finally decided to
put him in command at Harpers Ferry, where Lee had already sent
Colonel Thomas J, Jackson.
Davis regarded Harpers Ferry as a most strategic spot for
protecting Virginia. It lay where the Shenandoah River flowed into the
Potomac and where the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, which connected
the West with Washington, crossed the Potomac. Davis and Lee both
placed great value upon the retention of the command of the Shenan-
doah Valley and the position at Harpers Ferry. An evacuation, Davis
emphasized, "would interrupt our communications with Maryland,
and injure our cause in that State."
The President little suspected then what he would have to deal with
in Joseph Johnston. Within three weeks of receiving a commission in
the Confederate Army, Johnston was to be at open variance with both
President Davis and General Lee as to how the war should be con-
ducted.
While Johnston was in Montgomery, the President had under con-
sideration a pressing invitation from the Virginia Convention to make
Richmond the capital of the Confederacy. Davis was doubtful about
the prudence of such a move. From a military standpoint, he reasoned
that putting the capital so close to the Federal lines had serious dis-
advantages. If the Union forces were to concentrate on attacking Rich-
mond, they would be conveniently close to their base of supply,
whereas Montgomery was a thousand miles from Washington. On the
other hand, he saw an advantage to his government and himself as
Commander in Chief in being close to the field of operations. And he
fully realized the prestige of having the Confederate capital in the
state of Washington and Jefferson. Besides, Virginia deserved spe-
cial reward, for, with eyes open and courage high, she had offered her-
self as a potential sacrifice on the battlegrounds.
In Montgomery, Virginia's R. M. T. Hunter was an impressive lob-
byist for the removal of the capital to Richmond. Hunter, whose col-
lege mates nicknamed him "Run Mad Tom," from his intials, had been
United States Senator from 1847 to *86i and twice Speaker of the
LAST WEEKS IN MONTGOMERY 8l
House. He could talk well on English literature and he had remarkable
political sway over large assemblies. His great ambition had been to
be President of the United States. He would have relished the honor
of being the first Confederate President. Now, with four inches of fat
on his ribs, Hunter looked rather "tumbled-up" in the Montgomery
heat; "his hair invariably needed brushing, his waistcoat, pulling
down." A joke circulated that every time he beheld the tombstones of
the Montgomery marble yards on his way up to Capitol Hill, he would
groan in agony and predict that he would sicken and die in Montgom-
ery.
The poor food, the crowding, and the lack of comfort at the Ex-
change Hotel and the lesser inns proved weighty allies to Hunter's
persuasive lobbying. Mary Chesnut prophesied that "the uncomforta-
ble hotels here will at last move the Congress." Even though it meant
arduous repacking and unpacking, Varina Davis was an advocate for
Richmond, which was five times the size of Montgomery.
It had been rumored that the President would veto the removal ; but
when Congress adjourned on May 21, it was scheduled to meet again
on July 20 at the new Confederate capital in Virginia.
In mid-May, President Davis, accompanied by Secretary of the
Navy Mallory, took the cars for Pensacola. It was whispered in Mont-
gomery that everything was in readiness for an attack on Pickens.
Some military men said the fort could be taken. Toombs said it ought
to be taken. The President preferred to look for himself, to confer, to
decide.
By the time the President had reached General Bragg's headquar-
ters, he doubted a successful outcome. The Federal fleet was in sight.
The Powhatan, "stumpy, thick-set, powerful," was prominent among
the ships, repainted again like her old self and flying the Stars and
Stripes. Through glasses, Davis could see how heavily she was armed,
with "ten-inch Dahlgrens and an eleven-inch pivot gun, with rifled field
pieces and howitzers on the sponsons." Like the flagship Sabine and
the other vessels standing by, the Powhatan was ready for action. The
fort itself was formidable. Though General Braxton Bragg commanded
8,000 men and had diligently thrown up earthworks, strengthened his
batteries, and made his mainland position so strong that he did not
think his guns could be silenced, he knew that he could not take Pick-
ens without tremendous loss of life.
Bragg was anything but prepossessing in appearance. He was gaunt
82 JEFFERSON DAVIS
and somewhat cadaverous-looking. Despite his West Point training,
the North Carolinian stooped badly. His hair and stubbly beard were
grizzled. His bushy black eyebrows, which met in a tuft at the bridge
of his nose, gave him a forbidding expression. But his piercing black
eyes were bright and quick to note anything out of order, A victim of
nervous dyspepsia, he also was subject to migraine headaches. His
acerbity of manner alienated many who might have been his friends,
but he always showed the greatest esteem for Jefferson Davis. While
Davis had never found Bragg personally attractive or congenial, he
valued his proved qualities as an organizer and a disciplinarian.
General Bragg now invited his old comrade in arms at Buena Vista
to review the troops. As Jefferson Davis rode forth with Secretary Mai-
lory, the General, and his staff, he saw drawn up on the gleaming white
beach line upon line of well-trained volunteer organizations. The var-
iegated uniforms, sun-glinting muskets, and waving banners made a
colorful display. In the rear, to the north, the piney woods formed a
dark background; between the trees and the beach stood neat rows of
white tents laid out in company streets by regiments. The stretch of
blue-green water was broken by Santa Rosa Island, above which Pick-
ens reared grimly. On the parapet a Union band was playing "The
Star-Spangled Banner."
As the President rode down the Confederate lines, the Yanks
stopped playing out of curiosity. And as he passed along the volunteer
regiments, a model of horsemanship, the Confederate regimental bands
struck up, and the soldiers, throwing off constraint, cheered with their
mightiest voice. In the testimony of an eyewitness, "the wildest huzzas
not even restrained by the presence of their 'incarnate discipline'
[Braxton Bragg] told how firm a hold Mr. Davis had taken upon
the hearts of the army."
The President was particularly impressed by "the perfect state of
drill and efficiency" of six hundred swarthy Zouaves from the slums
of New Orleans. With their baggy scarlet trousers, white gaiters, blue
shirts cut low, and heavily braided jackets flung cavalierly off the
shoulder, they were a picturesque, if unclean, lot. Sunburned darker
than Arabs, with brutish or cunning expressions, muscular, agile, in-
ured to gutter hardship, living by their wits or their light fingers, they
were tough, resourceful, and chock-full of endurance. 8
The Zouaves were a striking contrast to the South Carolina boys
'The fastidious T. C. De Leon was fascinated by these Zouaves. These details are
taken largely from his sprightly book Four Years in Rebel Capitals.
LAST WEEKS IN MONTGOMERY 83
in their silver-trimmed gray, and to the Georgia "crackers" in their
butternut brown. The lawless lot of Zouaves obeyed their young, mid-
dle-class officers, who gave commands in French, and who, in cases of
flagrant insubordination, had little hesitancy in putting a bullet
through an offender's anatomy or cracking his skull with a revolver
butt. Bragg did not interfere with the Zouave officers' original meth-
ods of discipline.
That night, while the soldiers speculated on whether the Presi-
dent's visit might mean scaling ladders and a midnight assault on
Pickens, Davis held a lengthy conference. He agreed with Bragg and
Mallory that no attempt to take the fort should be made in the imme-
diate future. Even if the operation were successful, it might well cost
the lives of more than a thousand men, who were urgently needed in
Virginia. The President asked Bragg to send to Lee at once as many
troops as he could conveniently spare. Then he and Mallory returned
to Montgomery.
As information filtered through the camp that some regiments would
straightway proceed to Virginia, lusty cheers arose. The soldiers,
bored with drilling, were eager for action. The Zouaves were among
those chosen to go to Virginia.
On the way to Montgomery next day, at a "breakfast stop/ 3 while
the officers were eating in the station, the Zouaves uncoupled their
coach and stole the rest of the train. At dirk's point, the engineer was
forced to proceed to the capital. The red-fezzed hellions aimed to have
a high old time, and let off three months' pent-up steam before the of-
ficers could catch them.
Montgomery was shortly treated to memorable excitement. Grin-
ning Zouaves tore into saloons, scattered customers, filled themselves
with liquor. Some burst open grocery stores to get more grog. In shops
they appropriated any trifle that took their fancy. A few pantalooned
knaves, looking like illustrations from Arabian Nights, entered private
homes and scared the daylights out of the womenfolk. Up and down
the streets groups of Zouaves lurched drunkenly, roaring out "Zou-
zou," their favorite song.
Officials in the Executive Offices stopped work to stare from their
windows. As blacks and whites alike scampered from the streets, a
Georgia regiment was ordered to fix bayonets and hold the wild ones
at bay. The crisis was at its height when the relief engine and coach
came screeching into the station bearing the abandoned officers, who
began jumping off before the train halted.
84 JEFFERSON DAVIS
Into the roaring street mob and into the pandemonium of shops flew
the young officers, yelling commands, swearing in gutter French, and
felling recalcitrant thugs with pistol butts. When, on command of a
short teen-aged lieutenant, a gigantic sergeant hesitated in dropping
his booty, the youth leaped for his throat with one hand and cracked
him over the temple with his revolver. The habit of obeying officers
who meted out rough punishment asserted itself through the alcoholic
maze. Within half an hour, the rounded-up battalion, minus nine un-
conscious ones, was docilely mustered on Main Street. For Mont-
gomery, the spree of the Zouaves was the last big excitement in
its brief reign as the Confederate capital.
After the President's return to Montgomery from Pensacola, Mrs.
Wigfall brought him a perceptive letter, which she had received from a
friend in Providence. The Rhode Island-born lady had lived in the
South until her widowhood, when she had returned with her children
to her Northern home. Davis read with special interest :
We are always delighted to hear from you and indeed your letters and
Louis's are the only comfort we have in this Yankee land surrounded by
people who have no sympathy with us, and who only open their lips to revile
the South and utter blood-thirsty threats. This morning an amiable lady
wishes she had Jeff Davis in front of a big cannon. . . . We have now
sufficient proof of how much stronger hate is than love of country. Where was
the patriotism of Massachusetts when the country was at war with the
English in 1812? I lived then at the South, and was ashamed of my country-
men who refused to assist in the war. . . . Now they are subscribing millions,
and urging every man to go and fight their own countrymen. It is not
patriotism; it is hatred to the South, and woe is me, that I must live here
among such people. God grant you success. It is a righteous war and all the
bloodshed will be upon the souls of those who brought it on. ...
I think, however, that you at the South are wrong to undervalue the
courage and resources of the Northern States. They are no doubt less
accustomed to the use of firearms there are very few who know how to ride,
and they are less fiery in their impulses. They are less disposed to fight, but
they are not cowardly where their interests are concerned; and will fight
for their money. Where their property is at stake they will not hesitate to
risk their lives. 4
4 This letter in its entirety appears with other Wigfall letters in a most interesting
book by Wigfall's daughter, Loulie, Mrs. D. Giraud Wright: A Southern Girl in '61, the
War-Time Memories of a Confederate Senator's Daughter.
LAST WEEKS IN MONTGOMERY 85
The Rhode Island lady was right, the President agreed, in saying
New Englanders had plenty of courage, and doubtless they would fight
for what they believed their financial interests. Another friend
in Montgomery had recently received a mourning letter from
her Southern brother, now successfully established in business in
Chicago. While deploring the awful state of impending strife and ad-
mitting that the Southern States had an undoubted constitutional
right to secede, he declared: "We need you in our economy, and we
shall have to fight you in self-defense, for our own preservation."
The day before Congress adjourned, President Davis received both
good news and disappointing news. North Carolina unanimously
passed an ordinance of secession. The Confederacy now had eleven
states. But on that same May 20, because there was not a sufficient
majority of Confederate sympathizers in Kentucky to overbalance
those who wanted to remain in the Union, pro-Southern Governor Ma-
goffin issued a neutrality proclamation and warned both sides against
sending troops into the state. Davis had heard that Lincoln was partic-
ularly apprehensive about his native state and that he had remarked
drolly that he hoped God was on his side, but that he absolutely had to
have Kentucky. Davis, too, felt keenly the need for Kentucky; he
believed that if Kentucky left the Union, the North might give up the
war.
After Governor Magoffin declared for neutrality, the Confederate
War Department set up recruiting stations along the border of
Tennessee for the induction of Kentuckians who desired to join the
Confederate Army. Among these were three of Mrs. Lincoln's brothers,
all four of her brothers-in-law, and several cousins. 5 Kentucky was
painfully divided. Brothers parted to go to opposite camps. One of
John J. Crittenden's sons, George B., became an officer in the Con-
federate Army; another, Thomas L. ? held a commission in the Union
Army. In one wide street in Louisville, Union volunteers were seen
marching up one side, while Confederates marched down the other.
President Lincoln had made Robert Anderson a Brigadier General and
stationed him in Indiana, across the Ohio River, with a command
that "on paper" embraced Kentucky. Two of Anderson's brothers-in-
law put on Confederate uniforms.
5 Only one of Mrs. Lincoln's brothers was pro -Union. But he did not fight, and died
in iS62.
86 JEFFERSON DAVIS
Events in Missouri were more discouraging to President Davis than
those in Kentucky. Though Governor Jackson was ardently pro-Con-
federate, secession in that state had been at least temporarily defeated,
largely by the strategy of Francis Blair, Jr. Even before Mr. Lincoln's
inauguration, Blair had managed to get the war materials in St. Louis'
Federal arsenal moved across the river to Illinois. And he had
rounded up several thousand of the city's antislavery Germans and
started them drilling in their club halls. Despite the high irregularity
of the act, Captain Nathaniel Lyon, new commander of the Federal
arsenal, began swearing them into United States service.
Fiery, red-bearded little Lyon worked fast against the return from
Washington of General William S. Harney, who commanded the Fed-
eral Department of the West. Jefferson Davis had served with the old
Indian fighter Harney in the wilds of Wisconsin, and recalled that he
had been one of the few officers who had no interest in cards or gam-
bling, but made gardening his diversion. A thoroughly loyal Union
man, Harney yet believed in respecting the law of the land. Before
being summoned to Washington at Blair's secret request, Harney
had entered into a compact of peaceful neutrality with state authori-
ties.
During Harney's absence, in early May, when Governor Jackson as-
sembled some militia in annual encampment on the outskirts of St.
Louis, Blair sent Captain Lyon, heavily veiled, sunbonneted, and re-
putedly dressed in Mrs. Blair's blind mother's clothes, to spy on the
maneuvers. Driving through the camp in an old buggy, with a basket
of eggs concealing loaded revolvers, Lyon observed and made plans.
On May 10, the combative Captain led several thousand troops, largely
composed of Germans, out to Camp Jackson. At gun point he seized
seven hundred militiamen, appropriated 1,200 muskets, some twenty-
five kegs of powder, and whatever else he wanted. As he started off to
the arsenal with his prisoners, angry citizens tried to bar the way,
brandishing sticks, throwing stones, and cursing the "damned Dutch."
Soldiers began firing into the crowd. Twenty-eight persons, including
some women, were killed outright and many were seriously wounded.
The Camp Jackson "massacre" created a mighty indignation
throughout Missouri. A local civil war seemed imminent. When Gen-
eral Harney returned, he attempted pacification. Ordering the German
companies out of St. Louis, he sought to make a truce with the state
authorities. In the meantime, the Missouri Legislature had met, ex-
pressed condemnation, and passed bills for organization of militia.
LAST WEEKS IN MONTGOMERY 87
Former Governor Sterling Price, Virginia-born Mexican War veteran,
was made Commander in Chief of the state militia. Enormously pop-
ular, and known as a "Union man" who had voted against secession,
Price was so outraged at the tactics of Lyon and Blair and the extreme
Unionists that he became a devout secessionist.
On May 21, Price entered into a kind of cease-fire compact with the
trustworthy General Harney. Both the Federal and the state forces
would endeavor to prevent bloodshed and protect property of all citi-
zens. Excitement was allayed temporarily. But Lyon and Blair were
by no means satisfied. Both men wrote strong letters to powerful
sources in Washington. In answer, Captain Lyon received a commis-
sion as Brigadier General, and Blair was instructed to remove General
Harney if he saw fit. Before the month was out, Harney was trans-
ferred from the Missouri area and Lyon assumed his command. The
Missouri situation was again critical, and President Davis feared an-
other Maryland.
On May 24, the day after Virginia's voters approved secession, Gen-
eral Scott promptly moved Federal troops across the Potomac, occu-
pied the town of Alexandria and the neighboring heights of Arlington.
As if in revenge, because Lee would not lead the fight against the
South, Scott turned Mrs. Lee's ancestral home, Arlington, into army
headquarters. The estate, which had come to Mary Custis Lee from
George Washington's stepson, was looked upon as having a certain
sanctity by Virginians. They never forgave native-son Winfield Scott
for his action. As one newspaper said, the whole South regarded the
invasion of Lee's estate and Virginia's "sacred earth" as a "pollution."
General Lee, anticipating Scott's move, had written his wife some
days before: "I grieve at the necessity that drives you from your
home. . . . When I reflect upon the calamity impending over the
country, my own sorrow sinks into insignificance." On the twenty-fifth,
Robert E. Lee was transferred, with all the Virginia troops, to the
Confederate States Army.
That same day, President Davis learned of a little flare-up at
Harpers Ferry, which Joseph Johnston did not reach until May 23.
Colonel Thomas J. Jackson declined at first to recognize Johnston's
authority, although he was seventeen years Jackson's senior in age
and service. "Until I receive further instructions from Governor
Letcher or General Lee," the grim-faced Jackson said, "I do not feel at
liberty to transfer my command to another." But he finally surren-
88 JEFFERSON DAVIS
dered command when Johnston produced a paper with an endorse-
ment referring to him as "commanding officer at Harpers Ferry."
Because it seemed evident that the North might soon launch an all-
out attack on Virginia, Davis now decided to leave for Richmond as
soon as the archives could be packed. The captious Charleston
Mercury paid him a surprisingly generous tribute: "As to the object
of the President's hastening to Virginia, we are convinced that it is the
success of our cause which has attracted him. His presence will infuse
additional life and vigor among the troops. Finding him willing to run
any personal risk, they will emulate his example and defeat the hordes
of Abolitionists Lincoln has arrayed against us."
But two days before the scheduled departure on May 27, the un-
remitting labor and anxiety of the last three months finally prostrated
the President. War Clerk Jones noted in his diary, "He came down
with a chill"; adding, "he works incessantly, sick or well." The
weather had become intensely hot, and Mrs. Davis did not believe
"her husband able to travel. Apprehensively, she had watched him wear
himself down.
In a letter to ailing Clement Clay in Huntsville, on May 10, Varina
had written of her husband's working too hard. "He comes home to eat
his meals, but always eats under a protest against the time occupied.
'Oft in the stilly night, 7 he is forced to come home for there is no one
to help to work. Sometimes the Cabinet 'sans Scotch cap' depart sur-
reptitiously one at a time. To make a long story short he overworks
himself and all the rest of mankind."
Later, she wrote in her Memoir, "He left for his office before nine
and came home exhausted, and silent, if no guests were there. But,"
she continued, "he was so gentle and patient that Pierce Butler, a
houseguest at one time, asked me jestingly, behind his back, of course,
if the President was always a combination of angel and seer like that."
In his present feverish debility, his physician said he should not
make the trip. Jefferson Davis's will, however, made him rise and
dress himself in time for the train scheduled to depart at eight on Sun-
day evening. When his anxious wife saw him leave Montgomery, "it
was upon his bed." Since there were no sleeping cars at that time in the
South, a bed had been set up for him at one end of a private coach. The
President departed, accompanied by his body servant, Secretary of
State Toombs, Louis Wigfall, and Mrs. Wigfall. Varina, with the chil-
LAST WEEKS IN MONTGOMERY 89
dren, would follow at her convenience after packing and closing up the
house.
Aboard the train, the President went immediately to bed, or, rather,
reclined, after removing his coat, neckerchief, and shoes. Because of
his indisposition, precautions had been made to keep the journey as
quiet as possible. But the news leaked out, and everywhere along the
way, at all hours, eager people gathered, hoping to catch a glimpse of
their leader.
At Atlanta, Augusta, and Wilmington, crowds filled the stations,
cheering and calling for the President. Feeling constrained to respond,
Davis would rouse himself and make brief speeches. At some of the
smaller places, while he slept the sleep of the exhausted, a certain num-
ber of importunate citizens were permitted to tiptoe through the car
and take a look at his careworn face. At Goldsboro, North Carolina,
when the train stopped for midday dinner, the President went with the
others into the hotel dining room. He was instantly surrounded by the
town's prettiest girls in ruffled organdies, who wreathed him with
garlands and fanned him while he ate. North Carolinians knew Mr.
Davis only slightly. But when they saw him and heard him, they had
"an instantaneous enthusiasm for him." According to the press, his fine
presence, his austere handsomeness, and his beautiful speaking voice
stirred them strangely. As Mrs. Wigfall wrote her daughter, it was "a
glorious demonstration" all along the way. "The President was every-
where rapturously received."
"It was a terribly fatiguing trip," Mrs. Wigfall added. "The whole
country, as we came through, was like a military camp. The cars were
crowded with troops, and all as jubilant, as if they were going
to a frolic, instead of a fight.' 3
On this second stage of his journey into tragic history, while he lay
with eyes closed, Jefferson Davis must have reflected somewhat in the
vein of James Ford Rhodes's thinking three decades later. "Had the
North thoroughly understood the problem," Rhodes wrote in his His-
tory of the United States, "had it known that the people of the Cotton
States were practically unanimous; that the action of Virginia, North
Carolina, and Tennessee was backed by a large and generous majority,
it might have refused to undertake the seemingly unachievable task,"
CHAPTER VIII
'THE MANTLE OF WASHINGTON
FALLS GRACEFULLY"
ON THE MORNING of May 29, when the President's train emerged
from a cut through a bluff, Jefferson Davis could, from the spindly
James River bridge, see Richmond spread out like a panorama. Its
green amphitheatric hills were dotted with white houses and
punctuated by pleasing church spires. In its early summer flowering,
Richmond was picturesque. Far below, he observed the shallow cur-
rent foaming over rocks and gliding around the little islands to navi-
gable water some three miles from Hollywood Cemetery. As he looked
down on this beautiful burial ground, where President James Mon-
roe slept among the illustrious dead, Davis had no thought that ever-
green Hollywood was destined to be his own final resting place.
When the train pulled into the station, the President was greeted
by a salute of fifteen guns. A deputation, headed by Virginia's Gov-
ernor Letcher and the Mayor of Richmond, welcomed him and con-
ducted him through cheering crowds to the Spotswood Hotel, located
at the corner of Main and Eighth Streets. The hostelry's doorways,
windows, and halls were adorned with Confederate flags. His suite, the
best in the hotel, was garnished with flowers.
From the hotel balcony, President Davis made a brief, fitting
speech, and withdrew. Then Mississippi's young L. Q. C. Lamar ex-
cited the radiant street crowd. "Thank God!" he cried. "We have a
country at last, to live for, to pray for, and, if necessary, to die for."
Commenting upon the enthusiasm aroused all along the way by the
Confederate President, the Richmond Daily Enquirer declared: "The
mantle of Washington falls gracefully upon his shoulders. Never were
90
THE MANTLE OF WASHINGTON FALLS GRACEFULLY Q^
a people more enraptured with their Chief Magistrate than ours are
with President Davis."
In fact, the entire Virginia press welcomed Mr. Davis to the Old
Dominion with glowing warmth. His character and his ability were ex-
tolled. Emphasis was laid upon the remarkable advantage of having a
Chief Executive who was both a statesman and a man of military edu-
cation and experience. Davis J s superior mental vigor, his mastery of
detail, his thoroughness, and his personal charm were all specifically
praised. Difficult-to-please Virginia could not have been more de-
lighted with any man who was not a native son.
Hardly before the President had time to relax from the fatiguing
journey, he attended a crushing reception in his honor. At half past
five, accompanied by a cortege on horseback, he rode to the New Fair
Grounds, where an assemblage of ladies and gentlemen mingled with
the troops encamped there. When he left his saddle, he was all but
overwhelmed by the pressure of a crowd eager to shake his hand. In
his first speech to soldiers on Virginia soil, he addressed them as "My
Friends and Fellow-Citizens":
I look upon you as the last best hope of liberty. . . . Upon your strong
right arm depends the success of your country. In asserting the birthright to
which you were born you are to remember that life and blood are nothing as
compared with the immense interests you have at stake. ... I know there
beats in the breast of Southern sons a determination never to surrender a
determination never to go home but to tell a tale of honor, . , . The country
relies upon you. Upon you rest the hopes of our people; and I have only to
say, my friends, that to the last breath of my life, I am wholly yours.
With a sincerity that could not be simulated, Jefferson Davis made
them know that he was now absolutely dedicated to the cause of in-
dependence. Here was a man to believe in, to follow with confidence,
as volunteers had done at Monterey and Buena Vista. The cheering
was tremendous.
The Executive Offices had been set up in the Customs House, a
short walk from the Spotswood. The President's room was on the
third floor, at the head of the stairs as one entered from Bank Street.
Close by, the plain halls of the vast Mechanics Institute were being
partitioned into offices for the various departments of government.
Hammering and sawing made a din by night and day.
Both the Customs House and Mechanics Hall faced on Capitol
Square, a large sloping greensward area with winding walks under
Q2 JEFFERSON DAVIS
shade trees, all enclosed by an iron fence. The state capitol, with its
Grecian columns, occupied a center elevation. In the capitol the
President admired Jean-Antoine Houdon's marble statue of Washing-
ton, which Benjamin Franklin had commissioned in Paris in 1785. And
on the walk leading from the capitol to St. Paul's Episcopal Church, he
saw Thomas Crawford's dramatic equestrian Washington in bronze,
which the sculptor had been making during Davis's last years in the
U.S. Senate.
Capitol Square was a favorite rendezvous for colored nurses in
charge of children, and the President found it pleasant to see young-
sters in high spirits tumbling over the green lawns. Impressed as he
was with the classic simplicity of the capitol and of St. Paul's, he knew
that the most valuable structure in Richmond was the slate-roofed
Tredegar Iron Works, belching smoke down by the foaming river. The
only rolling mill of any size in the entire South and the only foundry
capable of casting cannon, Tredegar might prove more important to
Southern independence than any governmental agency.
Immediately, the President's burdens began to increase. Some
Northern papers were already clamoring "On to Richmond!' 7 Fed-
eral troops were daily pouring into Washington, D.C., only a hundred
miles from the Confederate capital. 1 Herds of beef cattle to feed them
grazed on the lawns of the Smithsonian Institution while awaiting
slaughter. A stout defense of Virginia had to be speeded, the new
republic put into mature routine, and persistent, unqualified office
seekers disposed of with tact.
Happily, in Richmond Jefferson Davis found able hands to help him
with the infant government. And the same feeling that animated Vir-
ginia's women in the Revolutionary War possessed them now. Every-
where women were at work, making clothing and even tents and car-
tridges. Davis was told that "the ladies were as determined to fight as
the men," and, half jokingly, that there was scarcely a house on Main
Street where they had not collected a "heap of rocks" and other mis-
siles, which they intended throwing upon the heads of Yankees should
they venture into Richmond. "If the women," wrote Catherine Cooper
Hopley, a British subject in the city, "did not positively shoulder their
muskets and set out for camp, they nevertheless took no mean share in
1 Professor W. E. Dodd wrote in his biography of Jefferson Davis that "More than
100,000 soldiers, including volunteers, had been put in motion by the North when
Davis reached his capital" (p. 245). But, of course, a large majority of the Northern
troops were volunteers.
THE MANTLE OF WASHINGTON FALLS GRACEFULLY** 93
the common cause, using all their influence and eloquence in urging
upon sons and brothers to 'resist aggression'." But the President did
not find Virginia's ardent men needing a prod; they were enlisting with
enthusiastic promptitude, after giving their young sisters and sweet-
hearts practice lessons in the use of pistols to defend themselves while
they were away.
General Lee had not been in Richmond to welcome President Davis.
He had gone to Manassas Junction to inspect conditions. He had not
found them to his liking. Only about 6,000 men were concentrated
there; the officer in command, General M. L. Bonham of South Caro-
lina, did not seem sufficiently experienced to handle that strategic
danger spot. An hour after his return to the capital, Lee was closeted
with the President to give him a survey of the state of affairs at Manas-
sas and a report of all that he himself had done since May i.
Davis was delighted to find his long-time friend in prime physical
condition; at fifty-four, Lee was easily the handsomest and most im-
pressive-looking officer in the Army. The President commiserated with
him on the loss of Arlington. Lee bore the misfortune with philosophic
stoicism, but he was grieved at his wife's inconsolable sorrow. Yet
Mary Lee, as Davis had heard, had been a secessionist before her hus-
band, and she invariably spoke of the Confederate cause as "glorious."
Now Mrs. Lee and the daughters were refugee guests in various coun-
try houses of friends. The President had asked Custis Lee, the eldest
son, whose Number One record at West Point had surpassed his fa-
ther's Number Two, to be one of his aides. The second son, W. H. F.
Lee, called Fitzhugh, Fitz, or, generally, Rooney, a strapping, vital
fellow, six foot four, was already a cavalry captain. The third, Rob,
Jr., a university student at Charlottesville, was chafing to enter the
service.
Lee, the titular Commander in Chief of Virginia forces, explained
that he had organized and sent into various fields some 30,000 men,
including those the President had dispatched from the Cotton States.
John Bankhead Magruder, who had been a plebe when Davis was
graduated from West Point and who was nicknamed "Prince John"
because of his elegance, was preparing a defensive line in the Peninsula
from Yorktown up to Williamsburg. Lee said that Manassas, the rail-
way junction near the little stream called Bull Run, only thirty miles
from Washington, should be strengthened immediately. Davis fully
agreed, and the two of them decided that Beauregard was the man to
send to meet invasion at Manassas.
94 JEFFERSON DAVIS
The President felt that no one could have done a better job of or-
ganization and arrangement than Lee had. It was heartening to have a
man of Lee's caliber as his adviser. In Montgomery, he had sometimes
felt more or less alone with his devouring multiplicity of cares; now
Lee could take much of the War Department's burden off his shoul-
ders, and at this critical time Lee's special knowledge of conditions in
Virginia was indispensable. An energetic worker, unsparing of him-
self, devoid of conceit, blessed with humility, a specimen of mankind
framed to inspire that was how Davis regarded Robert E. Lee.
"The life of Davis," as Dodd has written, "now merges to a con-
siderable extent with that of Robert E. Lee." Lee appreciated Davis's
understanding of military matters, which was sound, for his viewpoint
in war was essentially that of the professional soldier. And Lee was to
find in Davis a discerning and consoling champion, who never lost faith
in him, no matter what failures were chalked against him or what sar-
castic scorn the press meted out. This esteem of Jefferson Davis, wrote
Freeman, was one of Lee's greatest assets. The two men were in re-
markable accord from the first, and they were to agree on virtually
everything throughout the war.
The last day of May, 1861, had marked the end of the United States
Post Office in the Confederacy. On June i, Southern postmasters could
no longer accept letters bearing United States stamps. Shortly after
taking office as Postmaster General, John Reagan had sent a secret
agent to Washington, who enticed several high postal officials to join
the Confederacy and bring along their "forms, contracts, and needful
postal information." His chief difficulty now was lack of Confederate
stamps. Until engravers and equipment were secured from abroad,
postmasters would have to send letters unstamped on the payment
of the proper fee. 2
After being lionized in Richmond society for a couple of days, Gen-
eral Beauregard took command at Manassas. Immediately, he de-
manded 10,000 reinforcements. Although there was no visible sign of
imminent invasion, he threatened retreat if they did not arrive soon.
And straightway he raised a clamor against the Commissary Depart-
ment, headed by Colonel Lucius B. Northrop, who, he claimed, was
not sending the food required.
"The first crudely lithographed Confederate stamps of five-cent denomination in
green, bearing the likeness of Jefferson Davis were made by a Richmond firm and
appeared on October 16, 1861.
THE MANTLE OF WASHINGTON FALLS GRACEFULLY^ 95
Northrop was to become a prime target for general criticism. This
South Carolinian, who had entered West Point in Jefferson Davis's
last year, was prevented by a wound from doing regimental duty. He
had seen service in the United States commissariat. Besides his ac-
quired special knowledge, Northrop possessed, in Davis's opinion,
"strong practical sense and incorruptible integrity."
On Monday, June 3, 1861, Jefferson Davis became fifty-three years
old. He was feeling quite fit. At the height of his popularity, he was,
according to the press, indubitably the first name in the South. Three
special events marked his birthday: news of the death of Stephen A.
Douglas; the raising of the Confederate flag on the Sumter by
Raphael Semmes at New Orleans; and the first Federal victory, at
Philippi, in the mountains of western Virginia.
In mid-career, at only forty-eight, the North's great Democrat was
suddenly dead, his ambition unfulfilled. Mary Chesnut casually re-
corded in her diary: " Judge Stephen A. Douglas, the little giant, is
dead; one of those killed by the war no doubt; trouble of mind."
Did the death of Douglas augur ill or good for the Confederacy?
Davis reflected on how courageously and eloquently Douglas had
striven in the Senate to stem the tide of war, how he had pleaded with
the Lincoln Administration to evacuate Sumter and Pickens. But when
Lincoln called for troops, Douglas was the first Democrat to offer his
patriotic support. Recently, he had been touring the North to whip up
fighting spirit among the antiwar Democrats; reports said he had been
drinking excessively to whip up his own enthusiasm. Under the strain,
the powerfully built Douglas collapsed. Now, only seven weeks after
President Lincoln's war call, he was dead. It was indeed a blow to the
Northern Democratic party; there was no one with his impellent per-
sonality or political caliber to assume leadership.
Yet, Davis recalled, it was Douglas who had persuaded him and
President Franklin Pierce, against their better judgment, to support
the opening of the Kansas-Nebraska Territory, which inadvertently
stirred up bloody local clashes and pointed the way to war. And it
could be reasoned that Douglas's uncompromising ambition had split
the Democratic party and brought about the election of the Republican
Lincoln, which in turn had touched off a chain of secession ordinances.
Yet the removal from the scene of the Republican's foremost political
opponent could hardly be good for the Confederacy. Douglas might
have proved helpful to the South, which he understood better than
most Northerners, since he had been happily married to two Southern
96 JEFFERSON DAVIS
women successively. And, above all others, he had possessed the
strength and brilliance effective to fight vengeful radicals like Ed-
win M. Stanton, Charles Sumner, and Thaddeus Stevens.
On June 3, at New Orleans, Raphael Semmes, who was to become
the Confederacy's most noted naval commander, and his officers
messed on board the transformed Sumter for the first time. Semmes
had taken an old packet boat, "full of upper cabins and other top-ham-
per, as unlike a ship of war as possible," dismantled her, and recon-
structed the first Confederate vessel for preying upon Federal com-
merce in retaliation for Mr. Lincoln's blockade.
That same third of June, at Philippi, an insignificant village, Union
troops surprised and drove out a small Confederate force. This very
minor skirmish gave the North its first "victory" for the papers.
But by no means did the majority of Americans on either side of
the Mason and Dixon Line feel that actual war was inevitable. A
former West Pointer from Ohio, William Tecumseh Sherman, who had
resigned as Superintendent of the Louisiana Military Academy in
December, was mildly surprised at being summoned to Washington.
Now vice-president of the St. Louis Street Railway Company, which
provided horse-car transportation, he wrote the company president,
David Hartley Armstrong, a casual business memorandum dated June
7, 1861.
I have just received a dispatch from Washington calling me thither imme-
diately. I am going downtown and may be will meet you, but should I miss
you I leave this letter for you. We have on hand oats for say 8 days. Hay
plenty at lower stables and any day it can be bought at upper stables. I
may be back in about a week. At all events I will write from Washington
immediately what they want with me.
I wish you would look in occasionally and if anything occurs I will be
obliged if you would apply the remedy and I will stand by it when I get
back.
Everything is working smoothly and I think will continue to.
Your friend
W. T. Sherman 3
Sherman did not return to his job in a week or ever. After some
days, Armstrong received word that he had accepted a commission as
Colonel of the Thirteenth United States Infantry. Events moved
"David Hartley Armstrong, who was pro-Southern, was later United States Senator
from Missouri. This holograph letter from Sherman is owned by his grandson, Brigadier
General Donald Armstrong, Washington, D.C., who showed the author the original
letter and had it photostated for him.
THE MANTLE OF WASHINGTON FALLS GRACEFULLY 97
swiftly. In July he was commanding the third brigade at the battle
of Bull Run.
On the June 7 that Sherman wrote of oats and hay for the draft
horses, the Confederate War Department was agitated to hear from
General Joseph Johnston that he purposed to abandon Harpers
Ferry. He had been in command there less than a fortnight. Lee
promptly reiterated by telegram the great value the President put
on the place and reminded Johnston that the loss of the strategic
stronghold would be a blow to public morale and would injure the Con-
federate cause in Maryland.
"Notwithstanding this determination of the Executive," Johnston
coolly wrote in his Narrative of Military Operations (pp. 20-21), "I
resolved not to continue to occupy the place." Word had come to
Johnston that aging General Robert Patterson, a sixty-nine-year-old
veteran of the War of 1812, had begun moving down with a Federal
force from Chambersburg, Pennsylvania. Though Johnston had only
some 8,000 active troops at Harpers Ferry, Colonel Thomas Jackson
felt that the Confederates could easily hold the fort against the larger
Union army. Agreeing with Jackson were other subordinates destined
for fame: Edmund Kirby Smith, A. P. Hill, J. E. B. Stuart, and
Colonel W. N. Pendleton, Episcopal Rector of Lexington and a West
Pointer who remembered his artillery training.
But Johnston hesitated to withdraw only because he wanted the War
Department to take the responsibility of ordering him to do so. There
was marked asperity in the exchange of letters between Adjutant Gen-
eral Cooper and himself. When Johnston heard a local rumor that an-
other Federal army was moving toward Romney, a town sixty miles
west, he sent his quartermaster stores thirty-five miles away to Win-
chester. Then on June 15, the disgruntled troops, who were eager to
fight "Yankees," moved out of Harpers Ferry after destroying the
Potomac bridges and wrecking railway facilities and public buildings
that might aid the Federals.
As it turned out, Patterson had already given up plans of an offen-
sive and sent some of his troops back to General Winfield Scott, who
feared an attack on Washington. Jackson was utterly disgusted with
Johnston. All Richmond felt consternation at the withdrawal. Jeffer-
son Davis kept his thoughts to himself.
The first significant clash between Northern and Southern troops
came on June 10, around a country church called Big Bethel, thirteen
miles below Yorktown on the Peninsula, Some 1,400 Confederates
08 JEFFERSON DAVIS
under the general command of John Magruder, but led by North Car-
olina's D. H. Hill, tangled with seven Federal regiments belonging to
General Ben Butler's command at Fort Monroe. The Federals, num-
bering close to 4,000, were driven back with nearly one hundred casu-
alties. 4 The Confederates suffered eleven.
Magruder enthusiastically proclaimed the action as being as de-
cisive as any in the Mexican War. The Richmond Dispatch went
absurdly further, declaring Big Bethel one of the most extraordinary
victories in the annals of war. Hill was extolled as extravagantly as
"Prince John," and he, in turn, lavished praise on others, particularly
on Major George Wythe Randolph, a grandson of Thomas Jefferson,
who had commanded the guns.
Though this victory boosted Confederate morale, already roman-
tically high, Davis knew the danger and foolishness of regarding the
fight at Bethel as indubitable evidence of Southerners' superiority in
combat. To both the President and General Lee, the Bethel engage-
ment was chiefly important in pointing out the pressing need of build-
ing up the eastern defenses of Richmond. Potent assistance was soon
given Magruder, and lines of earthworks were thrown up at strategic
spots before Yorktown and Williamsburg. Largely because of this
engineering work ordered in June, 1861, Richmond was to be saved
from the onslaught of McClellan in the spring of 1862.
In revenge for the defeat at Bethel, squads of Ben Butler's
men made depredations on the lower part of the Peninsula, par-
ticularly in the county of Gloucester. Crops were wantonly destroyed,
furniture spoiled, some houses burned down. Bonds and private pa-
pers found in desks or in wall safes were torn to bits. Many valuables
were carried off by Federal soldiers and sent as souvenirs to Northern
relatives. Scores of slaves were stolen and reported as fugitives. Gen-
eral Butler termed the Negroes brought into his camp "contrabands
of war," and made them work harder for rations than they had worked
on the plantations.
On June 17, one week after the hullabaloo over Big Bethel, Presi-
dent Davis rewarded Colonel Magruder with a commission of brigadier
general. At the same time, ten other colonels were raised to the rank of
brigadier. Among these were three of Joe Johnston's command at Win-
chester: Thomas J. Jackson of Virginia, E. Kirby Smith of Florida,
and Barnard E. Bee of South Carolina. It was well that Johnston had
* D. H. Hill claimed three hundred Federal casualties, Douglas Freeman said seventy-
seven was nearer correct.
THE MANTLE OF WASHINGTON FALLS GRACEFULLY QQ
such able lieutenants, for a really formidable force of 20,000 was now
being collected by General Patterson to drive the Confederates up
the Shenandoah Valley.
Mrs. Chesnut reported in her diary that Richmond had been "hor-
rified" at Johnston's retreating from Harpers Ferry and blamed it on
"that slow-coach" Secretary of War Walker for not giving him enough
ammunition. In this criticism of Walker, which was general,
the usually astute Mrs. Chesnut was unjust. Walker had done every-
thing in his power to get ammunition from the various states. With
grave misgivings, President Davis had found that instead of pooling
resources of troops, ammunition, and equipment in the hands of the
Confederate Government, individual states, carrying out the letter of
the State Rights doctrine, withheld for local defense soldiers and arms
needed in general service. Some Governors even insisted upon retain-
ing certain rights over their forces in the Confederate Army, including
the appointment of officers.
This keeping of troops and material within states was caused partly
by the apprehension of a slave insurrection. While, in truth, this fear
was ever present and there was a definite need for "home guards," it
was exaggerated as an excuse for withholding troops and arms. Davis
often had a tough struggle to get possession of soldiers and equipment.
In theory, the individual states had transferred to the Confederate
Government the material captured at United States forts and arsenals,
but in reality most Governors retained a large proportion of the arms.
As early as March, 1861, on requesting arms, Secretary of War
Walker had received a communication from Alabama's Governor A. B.
Moore saying that he believed the arms "should be retained by the
State to enable her to meet any emergency and protect and defend her
citizens." 5
The President was pledged to defend the Confederacy at all points,
and, because of the intense State Rights feeling, it was inevitable that
military policy necessitated what is often criticized as "dispersion."
5 On July 4, 1861, while Federal General Irvin McDowell was massing forces at
Arlington for the conquest of Virginia, Governor Moore felt he could not release 3,000
men called by the Confederate Government. On the other hand, he equipped six regi-
ments and 2,500 more emergency troops to defend the Alabama coast, which was in no
danger. Even in his own state, President Davis met reluctance. On July 17, a few days
before the Battle of Manassas, Governor John J. Pettus of Mississippi was to telegraph
the Secretary of War that he had no power under state law to arm regiments that had
just been raised at luka, Mississippi.
1OO JEFFERSON DAVIS
In Virginia, Governor Letcher was not at all pleased at having to re-
linquish some of his power to the Confederate Government. Davis's
problems with the State of Virginia are innocently revealed in the
diary of Betty, daughter of the famous oceanographer Matthew Fon-
taine Maury: "He [father] is rather blue. . . . The President has
made it understood that now Virginia is given up to him and is one of
the Confederate States, all commissions and appointments given by her
are null and void. . . . There is great jealousy between the Virginia
and the Confederate forces."
The little victory at Big Bethel was soon more than offset by a sub-
stantial Confederate defeat in western Virginia. Lee had been so con-
cerned by conditions in that region that he had sent his adjutant, Brig-
adier General R. S. Garnett, to take charge. Complaining of an inade-
quate force, Garnett had left Richmond prophetically murmuring to
friends, "They have sent me to my death."
Western Virginia was extremely difficult territory, not only because
of its steep mountains, but because some of its pro-Union people
acted as spies and false guides. But soon Garnett was writing optimis-
tically that he held "the gates to Northwest Virginia and hoped at the
proper hour to swoop down on the twice as numerous Federal forces."
However, in late June, Major General George Brinton McClellan
entered Virginia from Ohio, with approximately 20,000 men. In May,
McClellan had resigned his position as President of the Ohio and
Mississippi Railroad, with headquarters in Cincinnati, to accept a
high commission in the Union Army. He had been put in command of
everything along the Ohio border, and now, leading twenty-seven
regiments, he was about to strike at the Confederate forces on Rich
Mountain.
The news gave President Davis considerable concern. The thirty-
four-year-old McClellan had been a onetime favorite lieutenant of his.
When Davis was Secretary of War, he had discerned the young man's
superior qualities and had sent him as an observer to the Crimean
War, in which capacity he had proved extremely able. Davis liked
this cultured Philadelphian, who was an adept in several languages
and a first-rate executive, besides being a good soldier. He believed
that with his intelligence, vigor, and qualities of leadership, McClellan
had the makings of a great commanding officer. Of all the Federal
officers, Davis would undoubtedly have preferred to have him on the
Confederate side.
THE MANTLE OF WASHINGTON FALLS GRACEFULLY 1O1
On July n, in a skillful flank movement executed by the Dutch-
descended Brigadier General William S. Rosecrans, McClellan's sec-
ond in command, the Confederates were routed, and General Garnett
was killed in a maze of mountain laurel. Although the Confederates
lost only seven hundred men, killed, wounded, or taken prisoner, Mc-
Clellan's telegraphic dispatches presented the event as a military
maneuver of peculiar brilliance. Though he himself was not even pres-
ent at the engagement, McClellan had planned it, and the Northern
press lauded him as if the battle had been equal to a second Austerlitz.
McClellan possessed a gift for self-advertising as well as a natural
ability to rouse the highest enthusiasm in his men. He caught the pub-
lic's imagination immediately and became the idol of the North.
With the arrival of the President, Richmond had really become the
capital of the Confederacy. The normally quiet city of less than
40,000 soon became gorged with office seekers, concessionaries, camp
followers, hangers-on. The presence of the Government had brought
a mighty influx of persons from other states, not only green recruits,
but anxious relatives who wanted last glimpses of their loved ones
before they went into battle. Hotels stayed packed. The homes of
gentry in reduced circumstances began offering boarding accommoda-
tions. Soldiers from the suburban camps strayed through the streets,
seeking amusement. Privates with proper letters of introduction
knocked at the best doors and were welcomed as honored guests.
Trains from the west and the south daily unloaded men in varieties
of uniforms. On the crowded streets, the Georgians' butternut jackets
and homespun grays were good foils for the scarlet pantaloons of the
New Orleans Zouaves and the blue-and-orange outfits of the Mary-
land Zouaves. Smartly tailored officers from South Carolina made a
striking contrast to Texan cavalrymen with their long hair, jingling
spurs, and peaked saddles, and to western mountaineers in bearskin
shirts and fringed leggings.
A large house at the corner of Clay and Twelfth Streets had been
bought by patriotic citizens, subscribing to a forty-thousand-dollar
fund, as a present from the city to the President. He declined to accept
it as a gift, though he was pleased to take it for his home upon condi-
tion that the municipality receive rent from the Confederate Govern-
ment. Built by Dr. John Brockenbrough in 1818 and known as the
Brockenbrough House, it was a handsome, three-story building of a
rather severe style. Its ceilings were high; its carved mantels were of
1O2 JEFFERSON DAVIS
Carrara marble. The apartments for entertaining were in the rear and
en suite, with a parlor between the drawing room and dining room.
Wide French windows opened on a sixty-seven-foot-long piazza, "noble
with towering columns." This veranda gave on a garden sloping in ter-
races, abounding in apple, pear, and cherry trees as well as flower beds.
From the upper windows, Jefferson Davis could see into Henrico
County, with its orchards and small farms. Nearer, were tree-shaded
suburban homes. To the southeast, he saw the James far below,
meandering toward Drewry's Bluff. On the second floor, he selected
the rooms for his private office and bedchamber. While the house was
being redecorated and furnished, the President's family were to be the
city's guests at the Spotswood.
When Mrs. Davis arrived with the children and servants and her
sister Margaret Howell, the President was at the station to meet his
wife in a carriage and four presented for their use by the City Council
until their own carriage arrived. Mrs. Wigfall wrote her daughter that
the people of Richmond seemed "disposed to do all they can to show
their joy at the exchange from Montgomery."
Varina Davis was delighted to find in Richmond many old friends,
like the Harrisons of Brandon and her "dear Lydia," wife of General
Joseph E. Johnston. In her first introductions to Virginia's ladies, Mrs.
Davis was impressed by the simplicity and sincerity of their manners,
their soft beauty, and "the absence of the gloze acquired by associa-
tion in the merely 'fashionable society.' " Though they received her
graciously enough, she noted a certain reserve. It was, she thought,
something like the wary manner of English county folk to strangers
when first introduced, no matter how impeccably.
Some days after reaching Richmond, President Davis had appointed
June 13 as a day of fasting and prayer throughout the Confederacy.
The South's newspapers urged due observance, with suspension of all
business activities. The nation responded in commendable spirit, and
from the pulpits ministers exhorted self-denial and resolution. The
church collections of the day went to support of the Army.
The President himself rarely failed to attend Sunday-morning serv-
ices at St. Paul's. But not even divine worship kept him from his du-
ties. During June he would go to the Executive Offices before or after
church. The third Sunday, before church time, while War Clerk
Jones was working alone in his office, the President "approached
lightly" and stood behind his chair waiting for him to look up. "At
THE MANTLE OF WASHINGTON FALLS GRACEFULLY** 103
length," Jones wrote, "I turned my head and beheld the President not
three feet from me. He smiled, and said he was looking for a certain
letter referred by him to the Secretary of War. . . . We then pro-
ceeded into the Secretary's office in search of it. The Secretary's habit
was to take the papers from his table, and after marking on them with
his pencil the disposition he wished made of them, he threw helter-
skelter into a large arm-chair. This chair now contained half a bushel;
and the President and I set to work in quest of the letter. We removed
them one by one; and as we progressed, he said with an impatient
smile, 'It is always sure to be the last one.' And so it proved. Having
found it, he departed immediately; and soon after I saw him on his
way to church."
Orderly in the extreme himself, Jefferson Davis found it hard to see
the lack of order in his Secretary of War's office. But he never took
Leroy Walker to task. He knew the high-strung man was not well;
Walker had tried too hard and overworked himself. But he seemed to
lack administrative ability, and he did not know how to "economize his
time." He had as much difficulty in making decisions as in keeping his
papers straight. One day, when his nerves were on edge, Walker said,
with a sigh, to Jones: "No gentleman can be fit for office." And
Walker, despite his tobacco chewing, was a gentleman; his wife was
a beauty and the best-dressed woman in the capital. Personally, Davis
liked Walker, whose patriotism was unsurpassed; he regretted that
he had little instinct for military affairs.
Davis knew he had made a mistake in acceding to the urging of
Yancey and Clement Clay to give the Alabamian the post. But,
blessedly, now he had Lee close at hand to advise him. Lee, like him-
self, took a hearty interest in the details of war. In the late afternoons,
the two would be seen, splendid figures on horseback, riding out to-
gether to the encampment in West End, where the volunteers were
drilled from morning to night.
After the middle of June, Mrs. Davis began holding small receptions
at the Spotswood. Occasionally her husband would attend. At one of
them the President sat for almost an hour in a tete-a-tete with Mary
Chesnut, whose sprightly talk he keenly relished. But this day he was
not very consoling to her. He was of the same mind he had been in, in
Montgomery: it would be a long war, and the South would endure
many bitter experiences before it was over. He laughed at the South-
erners' faith in their own prowess. "We are like the British," he said;
"we think every Southerner equal to three Yankees." "After Ms ex-
1O4 JEFFERSON DAVIS
perience of the fighting qualities of Southerners in Mexico," Mary
Chesnut wrote in her diary, "Mr. Davis believes that we will do all that
can be done by pluck and muscle, endurance and dogged courage,
dash and red-hot patriotism, and yet his tone was not sanguine. There
was a sad refrain running through it all."
Mrs. Chesnut did not know the sad refrain was in some measure
due to fresh concern over Missouri. General Lyon was threatening to
disarm all pro-Confederate citizens and put arms in the hands of pro-
Union men. In a called conference, Governor Jackson and General
Price had again offered neutrality. They would disband their militia
and keep out Confederate armies if Blair and Lyon would disband
their Federal troops, euphemistically called "Home Guards." Lyon
scorned the peaceful overtures. He would see every citizen dead before
he would concede that the State of Missouri could put any conditions
upon the Federal Government.
Gathering his many thousand well-armed troops, including "the
damned Dutch," Lyon started a military march on the capital, Jeffer-
son City. The surprised Governor fled to the northwest, and General
Price, who had gone recruiting in the western part of the state, soon
joined him at Booneville. Lyon and Blair had destroyed the idea of
peaceful neutrality. Governor Jackson now issued a call for 50,000
volunteers "to protect control of domestic affairs." Price took com-
mand in the field. Secession was not openly mentioned, however much
it was thought on. Missouri was still a huge question mark.
Davis longed to be able to send substantial troops to assist Mis-
souri's Governor and Sterling Price, but he had none to spare. With
the continued concentration of Federal forces in and about Washing-
ton, Virginia was in grave danger.
The Confederate President was naturally anxious about the tack
that would be taken when Mr. Lincoln's eighty days of personal rule
ended on July 4. Northern comments upon Lincoln's interim use of
power left no doubt, as Dr. McElroy has written, "that many Union-
ists wished that a less autocratic, less lawless leader, had been
chosen." In his address to the convened Congress, Lincoln reserved a
special bitterness for Virginia. "The people of Virginia," he declared,
"have thus allowed this insurrection to make its nest within her bor-
ders; and this government has no choice left but to deal with it, where
it finds it."
Almost immediately after Lincoln's address, reports reached the
"THE MANTLE OF WASHINGTON FALLS GRACEFULLY'* 105
Confederate President that the invasion of Virginia might be expected
at any time. General McDowell, with headquarters in Arlington, was
energetically whipping into shape a great army of green volunteers
with the help of 1,800 regulars. General Patterson was a constant
threat to Joseph E. Johnston's position at Winchester.
Two days after the United States Congress convened, Davis was
confronted with a most serious situation. A privateer, the Savannah,
had been captured by a Federal warship, its crew put in irons and
taken to New York charged with "piracy and treason." According to
Lincoln's interpretation of the war as a "mere domestic insurrection,"
they faced execution.
Davis acted with celerity and resolution. On July 6 he sent a stiff
demand that the men from the Savannah be treated as prisoners of
war, and not as traitors or pirates. In "strong ink" he wrote the
President of the United States:
It is the desire of this Government so to conduct the war now existing as
to mitigate its horrors as far as may be possible, and, with this intent, its
treatment of prisoners captured by its forces has been marked by the greatest
humanity and leniency, consistent with public obligations. . . . Painful as
will be the necessity, this Government will deal out to the prisoners held by it
the same treatment and the same fate as shall be experienced by those cap-
tured on the Savannah. And if driven to the terrible necessity of retaliation
by your execution of any of its officers or crew, retaliation will be extended
as far as shall be requisite to secure the abandonment of a practice unknown
to the warfare of civilized men, and so barbarous as to disgrace the nation
which shall be guilty of inaugurating it.
He sent Colonel Richard Taylor, son of Zachary, to carry the mes-
sage personally to Lincoln. The President declined to see him. Gen-
eral Scott, however, assured Taylor that Davis's stern dispatch had
been placed in Lincoln's hands. The sailors of the Savannah were not
executed. Davis's unequivocal stand resulted in an exchange of pris-
oners and the recognition that men captured on privateers would be
treated not as pirates but as prisoners of war. The Southern press rang
with exalted expressions of admiration for the firmness of the leader.
With the Federal Army preparing to advance on Richmond^ Presi-
dent Davis now conferred with General Lee and Adjutant General
Cooper for entire afternoons. Preparations for meeting the invasion
at Manassas took up the major portion of their conferences. The ques-
tion of supplying arms and munitions of war was the pressing consid-
106 JEFFERSON DAVIS
eration, for their lack was alarming. The problem of transportation for
reinforcements and supplies was disturbing in the extreme. On July
io ; Davis wrote to General Johnston at Winchester:
Your letter found me trying by every method to hasten re-enforcements
to you, but small as our force is, the want of transportation does not allow
me to send such as we have except at a rate which makes me heart-sick. . . .
Everybody disappoints me in their answers to my requisitions for troops, and
the last hope of a large force of militia coming to your aid seems doomed to
add another to past disappointments.
I know you will do whatever is possible, and that you will only follow the
dictates of your own good judgment and true patriotism. The anxiety of the
reckless and the short-sighted policy of the selfish may urge you to fight
when your judgment decided otherwise. The responsibility is great. I have
tried for a week to get off and join you, but have not been able to do so,
without having arrangements for procuring and forwarding troops to be
delayed if not deranged. . . .
May God bless and direct you in this critical hour of our national existence.
Your friend,
Jefferson Davis
Three days later, in answer to another pressing communication
from Johnston, the President, while himself "weary and heart-sick" be-
cause of his lack of arms to supply troops, sent the General a warm,
solicitous letter phrased to bolster his morale and forestall a retreat.
I realize the difficulty to which you refer of a retreat, and feel that it
would expose Virginia to temporary, if not permanent, disintegration. . . .
I have therefore resorted to a call for the militia in all the counties north of
James River from the Alleghany to the Atlantic. If they come with prompti-
tude and spirit and the sixteen regiments which I hope for from the cotton
States should arrive in time, we may yet drive the invaders from Virginia and
teach our insolent foe some lessons which will incline him to seek for a
speedy peace. I need not assure you that my confidence and interest in you
both as an officer and as a friend cause me to turn constantly to your
position with deepest solicitude. . . .
These two letters of July 10 and July 13 from Davis to Johnston,
which may be found in Official Records, Series II, Volume I, pages
973-974 an <l 976-977 respectively, reveal the President's courtesy and
"careful handling" in dealing with the commander of the Army of the
Valley.
By July 10, Beauregard's force at Manassas had been strengthened
to nearly 18,000 men. His official dispatches now revealed him as sub-
ject to fluctuating opinions. After he had got some of his brigades in
"THE MANTLE OF WASHINGTON FALLS GRACEFULLY" 107
position north of Bull Run, at the news of McDowell's imminent ad-
vance, Beauregard's feet turned cold. He wrote pleadingly to Louis
Wigfall to get the President to send him help. Davis read the letter
with some astonishment. At one moment Beauregard spoke despair-
ingly of "sacrificing so many valuable lives without the least prospect
of success"; and, in the next, he exclaimed, "Oh, that I had the genius
of Napoleon to be more worthy of our cause! ... If I could only
get the enemy to attack me, I would stake my reputation on the
handsomest victory that could be hoped for."
This letter of conflicting moods was followed by one to the President
revealing a confusion of plan and tinged with misgivings about being
able to hold his position. Then, on July 13, his spirits somersaulted.
He was no longer concerned with fears and doubts about defense. He
was inspired with an exciting idea for an offensive movement. He sent
Colonel Chesnut to Richmond to present his scheme orally.
On the fourteenth, when Chesnut arrived, the President immedi-
ately received him. That evening he called for General Lee and Gen-
eral Cooper to meet with Chesnut and him in his hotel parlor. The
three listened in amazement to Chesnut expounding from notes Beau-
regard's grandiose plan to take Washington and end the war. The
President was to order Johnston to join Beauregard with 20,000 of his
troops, leaving 5,000 to protect the head of the Shenandoah Valley.
(Davis, Cooper, and Lee knew that Johnston had only 11,000 men al-
together, and surely Beauregard knew this too.) The combined forces
would then strike and crush McDowell's 40,000 troops. Johnston
would return to Winchester with his 20,000 plus 10,000 lent by
Beauregard to destroy the Federals under Patterson. Then Johnston
would send enough troops to rout the enemy from western Virginia.
When the victorious Confederates rejoined Johnston, he was to in-
vade Maryland and march on Washington's rear, while Beauregard
would attack it from the south. "With 35,000 men properly handled,"
Beauregard argued, "I have not the least doubt that we could annihi-
late 50,000 of the enemy." 6
The three sagacious old soldiers in Richmond saw only too clearly
the eager Creole's miscalculations and blind assumptions. In Ms own
mind Beauregard had figured out the Federal moves and points of at-
tack and assumed that the enemy would accommodate him by mov-
a ln writing enthusiastically of this proposed strategy to General Johnston, Beauregard
proclaimed, "I f.hfnk this whole campaign could be completed brilliantly in from fifteen
to twenty-five days."
1O8 JEFFERSON DAVIS
ing according to his conception. The Confederate forces, inferior
numerically and in equipment, without modern artillery or adequate
transportation facilities, lacked the mobility Beauregard imagined.
Davis and Lee were uneasy not only at Beauregard's want of technical
reality, but by his seeming implication that he would manage the
forces of his superior, General Johnston.
Colonel Chesnut, who was in the conference all evening, annoyed
his wife by refusing to divulge any details. He tried to satisfy her by
telling her "how sensible and soldierly this handsome General Lee is."
"Lee's military sagacity was also his theme," she wrote in her diary,
adding, "Of course the President dominated the party, as well by his
weight of brain as by his position."
In rejecting Beauregard's plan for an immediate attack, the Presi-
dent replied tactfully and "moderately." He did not even point up his
doubt that an army with little artillery, inadequate ammunition, and
weak transportation facilities might encounter difficulty in storming
Washington. But he did suggest that it would be "brief and fruitless"
to retake Alexandria if Beauregard's "rear was not covered."
The cool, intellectual standard by which Jefferson Davis weighed
men was aided, as a friend expressed it, by "an intuitional flash that
made his judgment remarkably keen in most cases." For all Beaure-
gard's abilities and paradeful dash, Davis began to question his qual-
ifications for top command. Besides, he disapproved of Beauregard's
extravagant loose talk, of his boastful contempt for the North,
of his quoted assertion that the South could win even if her arms were
no more than "flintlocks and pitchforks."
With Lee's and Cooper's help, the President now devised a more
feasible defense for Manassas, by which Johnston was to join Beaure-
gard at the psychological hour before McDowell's attack. If Johnston
gave up his western position too soon, the Union army under Patter-
son might sweep up the Shenandoah Valley from Winchester. To the
discretion of the President was left the timing of Johnston's move.
While Lee now gave his energetic attention to throwing up stouter de-
fenses around Richmond, Davis struggled to build up the forces at
Manassas, where he expected the Federals to strike with all their
might.
By mid- July, General Scott had amassed around Alexandria the
largest force in America's history an army of 40,000 men, sup-
THE MANTLE OF WASHINGTON FALLS GRACEFULLY 1OQ
ported by modern artillery reckoned as the best in the world and more
than the Confederacy could yet field from its entire eleven states. But
the Commanding General of this Army of the Potomac, Irvin Mc-
Dowell, did not feel that his troops were ready for invasion. The
Northern press and the politicians, however, were impatient for ac-
tion. "On to Richmond!" was a persistent ringing chorus in the Gen-
eral's ear. Under great pressure, McDowell reluctantly made ready to
advance.
On July 1 6, President Davis received a secret dispatch that General
McDowell had begun to move his men south from Washington with
three days' rations in their haversacks. The news was not unexpected,
for, a few days earlier, a woman courier had arrived at an outpost of
Beauregard's forces with information that the advance was planned
for the middle of the month. The courier was a pretty black-haired
Maryland girl named Betty Duval, who had slipped out of Washing-
ton across the Chain Bridge, dressed in country calico and sunbonnet.
Once past the Federal lines at Alexandria, she had secured a horse
from friends, changed to riding habit, and galloped to General
Milledge L. Bonham's headquarters at Fairfax Court House, from
which he commanded a picket outpost of 3,000 men. Betty had said she
had an urgent message for General Beauregard, which Bonham had
promised to send to Manassas posthaste. She had then let down her
dark cascade of hair and extracted a package no larger than a silver
dollar, sewn up in black silk. The message, in simple cypher, had been
dispatched to Beauregard, who had rushed it to the President. Davis
promptly alerted Johnston in Winchester that the time was about ripe
for moving to Beauregard's aid.
The message, Davis knew, came from an impeccable source: a dis-
tinguished Washington widow and an avowed Confederate sym-
pathizer, who yet retained prominent Northern friends, including
Secretary of State Seward. The lady had been born Rose O'Neil, of a
Maryland planter family, and she had married the aristocratic Robert
Greenhow, Virginia attorney and scholar. Her sister was the wife of
Dolly Madison's nephew, James Madison Cutts, while her namesake
niece, Rose Adele, had married Stephen A, Douglas.
Davis remembered well the beautiful Mrs. Greenhow, with her fine
olive skin and flashing eyes. Her good looks and graceful figure were
matched by wit and a bluestocking's mind. She had had considerable
influence with President Buchanan and had been admired by Lord
11O JEFFERSON DAVIS
Francis Napier, the British Ambassador. Rose Greenhow was ex-
tremely attractive to men: Senator Henry Wilson, Abolitionist from
Massachusetts, was rumored to be deeply in love with her. Her modest
salon was the most popular in the capital; young men in government
posts constantly danced attendance. Rose ironically attributed her
enormous vogue to the fact that "the refinement and grace which had
once constituted the charm of Washington life had departed." The new
women, she openly observed, "were not of a class to shed much lustre
on the Republican Court." Mrs. Greenhow, Davis reflected, was an in-
telligent woman, hard to fool; any secret information she secured
would be genuine.
Colonel Thomas Jordan, Beauregard's chief of staff, who was
Mrs. Greenhow's chief espionage contact below the lines, had sent
George Donellan in disguise to Washington for more specific informa-
tion. He had presented himself at the Greenhow house with a card on
which Jordan had written two words in code: "Trust Bearer." Donel-
lan returned with the news that McDowell would begin his advance
on July 1 6 via Fairfax Court House and Centreville.
On July 17, while the President was preparing his message for the
opening of Congress on the twentieth, he received a dispatch from
Beauregard, the tone of which suggested the General's agitation.
The enemy has assailed my outposts in heavy force. I have fallen back
on the line of Bull Run and will make a stand at Mitchell's Ford. If his
force is overwhelming I shall retire to the Rappahannock Railroad Bridge,
saving my command for defense there and future operations. Please inform
Johnston of this, via Staunton, and also Holmes. Send forward any re-en-
forcements at the earliest possible instant and by every possible means.
Davis had Adjutant General Cooper telegraph Johnston at Winches-
ter to move at once to Beauregard's aid.
General Beauregard is attacked. To strike the enemy a decisive blow, a
junction of all your effective force will be needed. If practicable, make the
movement, sending your sick and baggage to Culpepper Court-House, either
by railroad or by Warrenton. In all the arrangements exercise your discretion.
The President began ordering all available troops to be rushed to
Manassas. He telegraphed Beauregard:
We are making all efforts to reinforce you. We cannot send today, but
afterwards they will go regularly, daily, railroad permitting, Hampton's
Legion, McRae's regiment, and two battalions, Mississippi and Alabama,
under orders.
"THE MANTLE OF WASHINGTON FALLS GRACEFULLY" 111
The next day he dispatched another reassuring telegram:
McRae's regiment, N.C. goes to you this evening. Barkdale's Mississippi
Regt. goes to you from Lynchburg. Hampton's Legion and others will go as
soon as possible. I have tried to join you, but remain to serve you here as
most useful for the time.
According to Colonel A. R. Chisholm, volunteer aide-de-camp,
when Beauregard got news on July 17 of Johnston's coming, instead of
rejoicing, he dramatically flung the telegram aside, crying "Too late,
too late! McDowell will be upon me tomorrow with his whole force
and we shall have to sell our lives as dearly as possible."
But his confidence returned in a few hours, for a Federal advance
guard that attacked the Confederate position under Bonham at Black-
burn's Ford was driven back in confusion. Beauregard dashed on
horseback to observe. He saw the Federals retreat. In his long, de-
tailed official report, a now- jubilant Beauregard blew up the engage-
ment to make it seem that "heavy masses" retired in "utter rout."
Bonham did take twenty Union prisoners, who were sent straightway
to Richmond. To the materiel-hungry Confederacy, the capture of
175 stands of arms and "a large quantity of accoutrements" was ac-
counted cause for rejoicing, and the papers made a minor victory out
of the skirmish.
On the morning of July 20, when the whole of Richmond was in a
hubbub over the expected clash at Manassas, the President, as he was
dressing to appear before the convening Congress, received a commu-
nication from General Johnston demanding to know his official status
and rank in relation to Beauregard.
Aware of Johnston's self-esteem, equaled only perhaps by that of
Gustave Beauregard himself, Davis took careful thought as he framed
a reply. These two officers, who guarded their amour-propre with the
jealousy of prima donnas, were to share a divided command. Harmony
between them at this most critical juncture was an essential to suc-
cess. The President sent Johnston this tactful telegraphic answer:
You are a General in the Confederate Army possessed of the power
attaching to that rank.
You will know how to make use of the exact knowledge of Brig, Genl.
Beauregard, as well of the ground as of the troops and preparation available
for the success of the object in which you cooperate. The zeal of both assures
me of harmonious action.
JEFFERSON DAVIS
The President did not casually choose the words "cooperate" and
"harmonious." Perturbed by Johnston's telegram about his rank on
the eve of battle, Davis became anxious lest some serious complica-
tion or misunderstanding between the two officers might arise. So he
determined to go to the battlefield on Saturday after he had delivered
his scheduled message to Congress.
Though in two letters to Richmond General Johnston had expressed
doubts about his power to retire from before the superior Federal
force under Patterson, who was only twenty-five miles away, he
masked his withdrawal skillfully. According to his friend and biogra-
pher Colonel Bradley T. Johnson, who was with him at Manassas,
Joseph Johnston, who had never seen volunteers march or fight before
this July of 1 86 1, was convinced "that they were utterly incapable yet
awhile of accomplishing anything with their legs." "President Davis,
on the contrary," the author pointed out, "had not seen the army of
the Shenandoah march, but he had seen the First Mississippi regi-
ment, with him as colonel, march and fight at Monterey and Buena."
He could have added that Davis set inestimable value on the Southern
volunteer if inspiringly led and directed, and this Thomas J. Jackson
was to do triumphantly.
While battle lines were being formed on both sides of Bull Run, the
President addressed the Confederate Congress on the State of the Na-
tion. Preserving an impeccably cool and collected demeanor, he men-
tioned briefly the "perfidy" of the Federal Government in regard to
deceptions concerning evacuation of Sumter and the scrapping of the
Fort Pickens armistice. Pointing out what he called Lincoln's "ingen-
ious sophistry," he said that now Lincoln had "abandoned all further
disguise and proposes to make this contest 'a short and decisive one 7 "
by having placed at the control of the United States Government at
least 400,000 men and $400,000,000. This, Davis declared, was an
avowal in the eyes of civilized man that the United States had aban-
doned the "absurd pretense of being engaged in dispersing rioters."
He emphasized that the Federal Government had recognized the
separate existence of the Confederacy "by the interdiction, embargo,
and blockade" of all commerce between them not only by sea, but by
land.
Davis charged the Lincoln Administration with deliberately at-
tempting to deceive the Northern people into believing that the pur-
pose of the Confederacy was conquest, rather than peace. He spoke of
"the cool and deliberate malignity" which makes special war on "the
THE MANTLE OF WASHINGTON FALLS GRACEFULLY 113
sick, including women and children, by carefully devised measures to
prevent their obtaining the medicines necessary for their use. 37 "The
sacred claims of humanity," he said solemnly, "are outraged in cold
blood by a government and people that pretend a continuance of fra-
ternal connections/ 7
But against retaliation, the Confederate President took an emphatic
stand. "All these outrages must remain unavenged,' 7 he declared, "save
by the universal reprobation of mankind. . . . They admit of no
retaliation. The humanity of our people would shrink instinctively
from the bare idea of waging a like war upon the sick, the women, and
the children of the enemy."
He spoke critically of President Lincoln's "trampling on all prin-
ciples of constitutional liberty/' of suspending the writ of habeas
corpus, and of delegating that power to military commanders.
Davis closed, however, on a note of high optimism. He was happy
to be able to say that at the end of five months from the forming of the
Confederacy, "not a single hostile fort presses the soil" of any of the
original seven seceding states. 7 He reported that the grain crop was the
most abundant in the South's history. He expected subscriptions to
proposed government loans based on cotton to exceed fifty million dol-
lars.
In the last paragraph, he spoke with stirring eloquence: "To speak
of subjugating such a people, so united and determined, is to speak a
language incomprehensive to them. . . . Whether this war shall last
one, or three, or five years, is a problem they leave to be solved by the
enemy alone; it will last till the enemy shall have withdrawn from their
borders till their political rights, their altars, and their homes are
free from invasion. Then, and then only, will they rest from
this struggle to enjoy in peace the blessings which with the favor of
Providence they have secured by the aid of their own strong hearts and
sturdy arms."
To deafening applause, and in the assurance that the nation was
heart and soul with him, Jefferson Davis retired. He walked the short
distance to his hotel and began to get ready to take the train
for Manassas.
7 Fort Pickens was on an island in the Gulf of Mexico.
II APT i: R IX
DAVIS GOES TO THE BATTLE
AT MANASSAS
THE PRESIDENT was detained in Richmond, however, through
Saturday and could not leave until Sunday morning. On that very day
his eldest brother, Joseph, was arriving with all his family for his first
visit to the Confederate capital. The President lamented the fact that
he could not be present to welcome the man who had been father-
mentor to him.
Turning affairs in Richmond over to General Lee and leaving all
unforeseen contingencies to be dealt with at his discretion, Davis
traveled as lightly as possible by a single-coach special train. He took
with him only one aide, his nephew Colonel Joseph R. Davis, son of
his sister Lucinda. He did not want to be encumbered with a staff.
Louis Wigfall was extremely miffed because he, too, had not been
asked to go, and he never quite forgave the President.
The morning had broken with extraordinary heat, and the temper-
ature mounted. According to A. H. Garland, Congressman from
Arkansas, that July 21 in Richmond was "the hottest, closest and most
sultry day" he had ever seen. The iron frame of the railway coach
made the temperature within it almost unbearable.
As the train approached Manassas Junction, Jefferson Davis no-
ticed a great cloud of dust to the west of the railroad. For a moment
he feared that Beauregard was retreating to the Rappahannock River
as his second line of defense. But the dust came from supply wagons
being sent to the rear for security. Minutes later, the two Davises
heard the sound of firing and knew that a general engagement was in
process. On reaching the junction, five miles from Bull Run, the train
114
DAVIS GOES TO THE BATTLE AT MANASSAS 13-5
was surrounded by excited men who had fled the scene of battle. They
were voluble with tales of Confederate defeat.
Singling out a calm-faced, gray-haired soldier, the President asked
for a lucid account. It was not encouraging. The man believed the
Confederate line was broken and the battle lost. The President in-
quired about the Commanding Generals. The man said that they were
still on the field when he left it.
The conductor refused to take the train farther. The President in-
sisted the train must proceed, since he could not get a horse until he
reached headquarters, and in the terrific heat he could not walk to the
battlefield. And there was no time for walking; the disorganized troops
had to be rallied quickly. The excited crowd about the station, fearing
the President's capture, sided with the frightened conductor. He was
finally persuaded, and agreed to detach the coach and run the Presi-
dent some distance forward in the locomotive. So Davis and his
nephew climbed up into the cab and rode toward the battlefield.
At headquarters, they found Beauregard's Adjutant General, Jor-
dan, who emphasized both the danger and the impropriety of the Pres-
ident exposing himself. But he provided horses and pointed out the
route.
As the Davises proceeded, demoralized stragglers became more
numerous. They warned of the hazards ahead and begged the Presi-
dent to go back. Joe Davis also advised against proceeding. "But," in-
sisted the President, "this is not the time to go back. We must go for-
ward." Wounded men, lying helpless under trees, cheered Jeff Davis
as he went on. One incapacitated stripling being painfully borne on
the shoulders of a comrade to the rear took off his cap and waved it
cheerfully at the Chief. Coming upon some exhausted troops stretched
out beside a captured Federal cannon, the President heard the word
passed, "It's Jeff Davis!" The men on the ground roused. One mortally
wounded boy raised himself on his elbow, took off his cap, threw it into
the air, crying "Hurrah for Jeff Davis!" and sank back dead.
As the President advanced, "the battle rolled westward and lost its
fury." All along the way, retreating stragglers, seeing the President
riding forward, began returning to the fray, though the dust swirled
up from the bone-dry fields and the panting men were obviously suf-
fering from thirst.
When the President reached Joseph Johnston, on a hill command-
ing a wide view, the General told him the Confederates had won the
battle. The Federals were now retreating toward Centreville. Johnston
Il6 JEFFERSON DAVIS
said he had sent orders to General Bonham at Mitchell's Ford to cut
them off. Jeb Stuart was charging with his small cavalry command
from the left.
Davis left Johnston and rode farther west. He was joined by a small
band of horsemen led by Captain John Lay, who insisted that the
President was too near the enemy to proceed without escort. His good
friend James Chesnut, who had been dashing about all day sending
regiments to this place and that, rode up and joined the party. Shortly,
they approached a column of infantry that turned out to be Federals.
When the men in blue broke, Lay's force gave chase. 1 "This," in
Davis's words, "was the last of the enemy's forces maintaining their
organization, and showing a disposition to dispute the possession of
the field of battle." Davis and his companions rode on, remarking the
line of fugitive flight. "Here was a musket, there a cartridge-box, there
a blanket or overcoat, a haversack, as if the runner had stripped him-
self of all impediments to speed. . . . The signs of an utter rout of the
enemy were unmistakable."
As the sun set behind the blue-hazed mountains, Davis reached
the extreme left of the Confederate lines and greeted Kirby Smith's
troops, whose fortunate arrival had averted impending disaster. The
exhausted men, who had had to double-quick five miles from the sta-
tion to reach the firing line, said they had chased the enemy until they
disappeared to the northeast, in the direction of Washington. Almost
immediately on reaching the enemy's line, General Smith had been
dangerously wounded: a Minie ball had grazed his upper spinal
column, torn the neck muscles, and passed out near the collarbone.
He had given the command to his senior colonel, Arnold Elzey
of Maryland.
According to eyewitness Private W. W. Goldsborough of the First
Maryland Infantry, when President Davis rode up to Colonel Elzey,
his countenance was "beaming with excitement and enthusiasm."
"General Elzey," he said, extending his hand, "you are the Blucher
of the day."
The President saw night closing in on the exhausted, bloodstained
men, who had no shelter but the trees and who had eaten nothing for
eighteen hours. But noting that their position was well adapted for
pursuing the fleeing foe, he made brief, inspiring addresses along the
lines, begging the men to stay where they were. He promised to send
*Mrs. Chesnut recorded in her diary that her husband continued the chase with Lay's
men until midnight, when a torrential rain halted them.
DAVIS GOES TO THE BATTLE AT MANASSAS ll/
food and supplies as quickly as possible. Night soon fell, and the
President rode back in the dark to headquarters. Though there was a
moon, it was obscured by clouds.
When Davis arrived, he congratulated General Johnston with
fervent warmth. He asked that food be sent immediately to Kirby
Smith's ravenous men. A quantity of ham and hard bread was dis-
patched. Beauregard had not yet returned. Not conceiving the extent
of the Federal defeat, he was moving the tired brigades from the left
to the right to resist an expected counterattack.
While official facts were being compiled, Davis sent a telegram to
his wife at the Spotswood Hotel.
We have won a glorious though dear-bought victory. Night closed on the
enemy in full flight and closely pursued.
Attorney General Benjamin got the news from Mrs. Davis immedi-
ately and walked over to the Executive Offices, where the Cabinet was
assembled. He repeated from memory the exact words and let the press
correspondents have the message.
While Richmond went into a delirium of joy, the President, in con-
ference with the two top generals, discovered that the assumption that
had caused him to wire the two words "closely pursued" was not en-
tirely justified. After Beauregard's return at about ten o'clock, and
after more information from the field had come in, Davis sent a more
restrained "official" telegram to Adjutant General Cooper.
Night has closed upon a hard-fought field. Our forces were victorious. The
enemy were routed, and precipitately fled, abandoning a large amount of
arms, knapsacks, and baggage. The ground was strewn for miles with those
killed, and the farm-houses and ground around were filled with the
wounded. Pursuit was continued along several routes towards Leesburg and
Centreville, until darkness covered the fugitives. We have captured many
field batteries and stands of arms, and one of the United States flags. Many
prisoners have been taken. Too high praise can not be bestowed, whether for
the skill of the principal officers, or the gallantry of all our troops. . . ?
That Sunday night at headquarters, Jefferson Davis got a clearer
picture of the battle activities. He learned that Brigadier General
Thomas J. Jackson had arrived with the first troops at noon Saturday,
*Both of the telegrams Davis sent on the night of victory appear as quoted in
Official Records, Series I, Vol. II. pp. 9^6-987. Though the longer one is addressed to
General Cooper, there is no indication that the earlier short one was sent to Mrs.
Davis. But both War Clerk Jones and Mrs. Davis in her Memoir are authorities that
she was the recipient, and- the Richmond papers so stated.
Il8 JEFFERSON DAVIS
followed shortly by General Johnston, who said he expected the rest
to reach Manassas that same night. The Commanding General had
been somewhat surprised that Beauregard had concentrated so many
troops on the right, four full brigades, compared to one in the center
and two on the left.
But being very tired, General Johnston told the younger man to
prepare the combat order while he caught a little sleep. At half past
four on Sunday morning, Beauregard handed him the battle plan,
which called for an immediate attack on McDowell at Centreville. But
it had to be discarded, because, soon after 5:00 A.M., Federals began
firing on the Confederate left. As General Jubal Early wrote: "The
battle which General Beauregard planned was never fought, because
the enemy did not move as he expected him to move."
From the Confederate standpoint, many things went wrong. Gen-
eral Richard S. Ewell had been alerted to be ready to advance on Cen-
treville, but not until 8:30 did someone remember to send him the or-
der to move. Then the courier could not find Ewell. At 10:30 it was
too late for him to lead an offensive; so Beauregard ordered him to
move south of Bull Run.
On a commanding hill, half a mile behind Mitchell's Ford, Johnston
and Beauregard took a position where they could view the battlefield
diorama-fashion. As the enemy's modern guns roared like thunder,
the valley before them swirled with smoke and dust. When the bat-
tle to the left became more furious, Johnston told Beauregard to send
immediately all possible troops to that area. Johnston, soon followed
by Beauregard, rode four miles to the scene and observed from another
rise. He saw the critical situation that had developed, for McDowell
had about 17,000 men across the stream on the south side of Stone
Bridge. The Federal commander had extended his line toward the
southwest until it resembled a crescent. At noon the Union troops were
dislodging the Confederates, pushing them back disastrously. Beaure-
gard, who had mistakenly believed that McDowell would strike at his
right, had put his major strength in the wrong place. Realizing his al-
most fatal error, he bravely attempted to inspire the weakhearted with
eloquent words and daring personal exposure on the field. But many
Confederates, believing they were being slaughtered by the Northern
forces, continued to maneuver themselves to the rear. Those who
fell back to Henry Hill were half dazed by the Federal onslaught.
General Barnard Bee's men, who caught the brunt of the battle,
were giving way under the enemy's mighty thrusts. He was forced to
DAVIS GOES TO THE BATTLE AT MANASSAS
give orders to retire. His soldiers, though losing cohesion, fought as
they fell back, turning now and then, staying the enemy. Bee shouted
to Jackson, "General, they are driving us back." "Sir, give them the
bayonet," Jackson yelled encouragingly.
A little later, after a desperate effort to rally his hard-pressed forces,
Bee expected Jackson to move down to his relief. But Jackson, having
a good tactical position on Henry Hill, though bullets whizzed about
him, stood motionless where he was. As Bee saw his own men drop-
ping all around him, he audibly denounced Jackson "in a passionate ex-
pression of anger" for "standing there like a stone wall" and allowing
Bee's regiment to be sacrificed. 3 A few moments after giving vent to his
emotion in a phrase that was to immortalize Jackson, the gallant Bee
fell, mortally wounded. Bee's brother-in-law and aide-de-camp, James
Hill, who was with him when he fell and at his deathbed, declared
that Bee, in his excitement and despair, condemned Jackson for refus-
ing to move to his aid. Johnston's chief of staff, Major T. G. Rhett,
who reached Bee after his fall and was with him when he died, also
gave the bitter version of Bee's cry.
No one has ever attributed an unworthy motive to Jackson, for he
was unflinchingly brave, but he was ever known to do what he thought
best from a military point of view, regardless of whom it helped or
hurt. Whatever the true circumstances, the epithet "Stonewall" would
not have stuck in history if it had not accorded with the intrepid Jack-
son's fixity of purpose and undaunted courage.
Jackson, who had been painfully wounded in the hand early in the
day, withstood the new pressure of the enemy's attack, as Johnston
and Beauregard galloped onto the field. Johnston, seizing the standard
of a disintegrating Alabama regiment, offered to lead them. Beaure-
gard sprang from his horse and shouted to the troops, "I have come
here to die with you!" Finally, battlelines were more or less re-estab-
lished, but the situation was desperate. At this point Beauregard had
less than 7,000 infantry and artillerists engaged and only thirteen
cannon. The Federals caught the idea that they had already won the
day, and the news of victory went to the rear guard. Telegraph wires
8 The phrasing above is Colonel John HaskelFs in his unpublished "Memoirs." HaskeH
knew both Bee and Jackson, and said he told the true story only "to show how things
can be distorted afterwards." The Richmond correspondent of the Charleston Mercury
was the first to report the "Stonewall" incident, three days after the fight, and in his
version, which history has chosen to accept as orthodox, he had South Carolina's hero,
Bee, speak in admiration, adding the words: "Let us determine to die here, and we win
conquer. Follow me." Freeman reports HaskePs account in an appendix to R. E. Lee.
12O JEFFERSON DAVIS
carried it north. At noon, official Washington was already exulting,
and President Lincoln arranged to take an afternoon carriage drive.
The truth was that the Confederates were whipped, but their officers
did not know it. The Southerners had been flanked by numbers that
seemed overwhelming. Beauregard now begged Johnston to retire
and let him manage the battle. He said the Commanding General
should be safe where he could survey the whole field and send rein-
forcements. At first, the astounded Johnston refused to leave. Then
he retired a mile and a half and began ordering more troops from the
right to save the left.
Beauregard dashed courageously along the lines, rallying the con-
fused men, trying to get them into positions to meet the next attack.
With pithy eloquence he flattered and exhorted. When the bearer of
South Carolina's Palmetto flag was felled, Beauregard asked to carry
it himself. When his horse was shot from under him, he quickly
mounted another. "With eyes flaming, his countenance blazing with
enthusiasm, he pointed his sword at the enemy" and urged the men
forward.
From one o'clock to three the Federals and the Confederates con-
tended for Henry Hill. First one side had it, then the other. Old Mrs.
Judith Henry, bedridden, dying of a mortal disease, was relieved of
her misery when a shell burst in her bedroom. She became the first
civilian killed in the war. Not far away, Colonel Francis Bartow,
Georgia's "most promising spirit," was shot through the heart.
When Beauregard saw an approaching column about a mile to the
southwest, he feared Patterson's troops had arrived from Charles
Town and Harpers Ferry. "At that moment," he later confessed, "my
heart failed me." But a breeze shook out the folds of the flag, and he
saw the Confederate colors. Brigadier General Kirby Smith and his
men had finally arrived and were coming on the double-quick.
Smith's forces had been delayed because they had had to wait for a
day and a half at Piedmont for transportation on the overworked line.
The exhausted trainmen had been compelled to get some sleep. The
troops had got aboard the cars only at two o'clock that morning. It was
one o'clock in the afternoon when they reached Manassas Junction,
where word from Johnston awaited them to push forward with all pos-
sible dispatch. Throwing off their knapsacks, they had struck
out across the country in the direction of the artillery smoke. Though
nearly prostrated by the terrible July heat and their own dust, they
covered the four miles rapidly. Within a mile of the battlefield, wagons
DAVIS GOES TO THE BATTLE AT MANASSAS 121
coming at headlong speed blocked the road. Scores of fugitives urged
them back. "All is lost!" they cried. "The army is in full retreat. Go
back or you'll be cut to pieces. 5 '
Colonel Elzey of Maryland, second in command, gave the order
"Forward!" "Pay no attention to cowards and skulkers," he cried.
"Charge!"
With one wild, deafening yell, amidst a hail of bullets, the Confed-
erates charged. Kirby Smith was wounded in the first charge,
and Elzey assumed full command with skill and daring. At the first
sound of the Marylanders 3 Rebel yell, the high-pitched, triumphant
screech was taken up by Southerners all along the front, and they, too,
started rushing forward. "Yell like furies," Jackson commanded his
men as they bore down on the Federals. The amazed enemy were
driven pell-mell from their strong position and pursued through a
thicket. Other troops, under Jubal Early, having made a rapid swing
around from the Confederates 5 right, joined Elzey's brigade for the
final blows against McDowell's extreme right flank.
About the same time, the Federals lost the Griffin and Rickett bat-
teries, just after they had been moved into strategic position on Henry
Hill. By a fatal error, Captain Charles Griffin mistook the advancing
Thirty-third Virginia, who were still wearing their old-time blue uni-
forms, for Federals. He held his fire until the Confederates had ap-
proached to pistol range and leveled their muskets. In the instant that
he realized his mistake and opened his mouth to give the order that
would have annihilated the Confederates with canister, the Southern-
ers' murderous volley virtually wiped out the Federal artillerists.
The Confederates quickly seized the guns and turned them on the
flabbergasted supporting regiments, who had just witnessed the
table-turning. The Union infantrymen fired one or two volleys, then
turned and fled down the hill. The tough New York Fire Zouaves,
who had sworn to hang Jeff Davis's scalp in the Capitol, led the get-
away. James B. Ricketts, seriously wounded, was taken prisoner. 4 A
Confederate named Allan Green stumbled over an abandoned port-
manteau containing a supply of clean shirts. Slipping behind a tree,
he stripped off his own sweat-drenched shirt, put on a fresh Yankee
one, and returned eagerly to the fray. But the fighting was all but
over.
Just when McDowell had thought he would clinch the victory, Fed-
4 Ricketts's wife was permitted to visit her husband in prison and nurse him. Several
Richmond ladies called on her and extended social courtesies as well as sympathy.
JEFFERSON DAVIS
eral commands got mixed and organization broke down, partly because
he could not keep in touch with brigade commanders in the woods. Ac-
cording to Lloyd Lewis, General McDowell was suffering from an acute
bowel complaint caused by eating tainted canned fruit the night be-
fore, which made horseback riding so unbearable that he had to dash
about the field in a carriage. When McDowell saw that Henry Hill
was definitely lost and that Kirby Smith's forces had routed his right,
he ordered retreat. Jefferson Davis had arrived in time to see the backs
of the fleeing Federals.
CHAPTER X
FANTASTIC ROUT
IN THE HEADQUARTERS tent near midnight on July 21, Presi-
dent Davis sat at a table with Colonel Thomas Jordan, Beauregard J s
chief of staff, opposite him, and Beauregard and Johnston facing each
other. When he had finished writing his victory dispatch to General
Cooper, someone brought out cigars. After some moments of relaxa-
tion from the terrible strain of the day, the President asked pointedly,
"What troops are pursuing the enemy?"
The Generals looked at each other. "None," one of them replied.
Davis could not veil his surprise. Jordan spoke up and said that a
report had come from one of Johnston's captains that he had been as
far as Centreville and had seen the Federal Army completely routed
and in full flight toward Washington.
The President inquired which brigade had suffered the least fatigue
during the day. General Bonham's was mentioned; it had been sta-
tioned at the far right, where Beauregard had mistakenly figured the
main attack would come. The President suggested that Bonham be or-
dered in pursuit at once. Both Generals remained silent. Finally,
Colonel Jordan asked the President if he himself would dictate the or-
der. Mr. Davis at once dictated an order for immediate pursuit. 1
1 Jordan wrote from 63 Broadway, New York, on April 18, 1878, "Mr. Davis with
much animation asserted the necessity for an urgent pursuit that night by Bonham,
who, with his own brigade and that of Longstreet, was in dose proximity to Centreville
at that moment. . . . This was the only instance during Mr. Davis's stay at Manassas
in which he exercised any voice as to the movement of the troops. . . . His bearing
towards the generals was eminently proper; and I repeat he certainly expressed no oppo-
sition to a forward movement, nor did he display the least disposition to interfere by
opinion or authority touching what the Confederate forces should or should not do."
"General Johnston," Jordan added, "was decidedly averse to an immediate offensive, and
123
124 JEFFERSON DAVIS
After he had finished, Johnston protested, "The men are too tired to
go on their own legs and there is no adequate transportation for them."
Beauregard spoke of formidable defenses at Alexandria, which he was
deceived in thinking existed.
When someone recalled that the captain who had reported the rout
had a reputation for romantic exaggeration, the President, considering
the hazards of a night march and the Generals' reluctance, modified
his order; "immediate pursuit" was changed to read instead: "to be
commenced at dawn." After he had reworded the order, Colonel Jordan
said to him, from across the table, "If you will send the order, sir, as
you first dictated it, the enemy won't stop till he gets into the Poto-
mac."
General Thomas J. Jackson, a mile or so away, was perhaps even
more sanguine than Colonel Jordan or the President. "Give me ten
thousand fresh troops," he is reported to have said earlier that night,
"and I would be in Washington tomorrow." But the word "fresh" was
a poser, for there were hardly 2,000 fresh troops to be had at that hour.
The President went to sleep believing that Bonham would lead a
full-scale pursuit at dawn. Before day broke, he was awakened by a
downpour of terrific violence, and feared the chase would be impeded.
But he did not dream that Beauregard had scrapped the order with the
President's signature and substituted one of his own, "Special Orders
140," which did little more than call for a reconnaissance in force and
the collection of abandoned supplies, to be sent in wagons down to
headquarters. 2
At early breakfast, with a warm smile, the President handed Beaure-
gard a note, which he had composed before he retired: "Appreciating
your services in the battle of Manassas and on several occasions dur-
ing the existing war, as affording the highest evidence of your skill as
a commander, your gallantry as a soldier, and your zeal as a patriot,
you are appointed to be General in the army of the Confederate States
of America. . . ," In less than five months, Davis had elevated the
Creole officer from a major to a full general.
emphatically discountenanced it as impracticable." Jordan was no friend of Jefferson
Davis, but very close to Beauregard. On April 24, 1878, Beauregard forwarded Jordan's
letter to Davis and wrote: "The account given herewith by General Jordan of what
occurred there respecting further pursuit that night agrees with my own recollection."
Letters and comments on this subject are to be found hi Jefferson Davis's Rise and Fall
of the Confederate Government. The original letters are in Confederate Memorial Hall,
New Orleans.
'After the war, General Bonham sent to Davis Beauregard's original order. It is
quoted hi full in The Rise and Fatt of the Confederate Government, p. 309.
FANTASTIC ROUT 125
In another tent, while the rain poured dismally, Jackson sat
ruminating on the victory and nursing his wounded left hand. Per-
haps to ease his vague discontent at the lack of orders to move for-
ward, Jackson took up a pen and wrote a characteristic note in formal,
businesslike phrases to the Presbyterian minister at Lexington. He
did not mention the Confederate success.
My dear Pastor
In my tent last night, after a fatiguing day's service, I remembered that I
failed to send you my contributions to our colored Sunday School. Enclosed
you will find my check to that object, which please acknowledge at your
earliest convenience, and oblige
Yours faithfully
T. J. Jackson
When first light came, Bonham's men were roused and, despite the
downpour, moved forward. The night before, Colonel Jeb Stuart's
cavalry had chased retreating Federals twelve miles beyond Manassas.
They had captured so many prisoners along the way sending them
back under guard to the infantry that he "hardly had a squad left"
when he encamped after midnight on Sudley's farm. Nearby Sudley,
a church used as a hospital by the enemy contained about three hun-
dred wounded, "the majority mortally/' according to Stuart's report
in Official Records. As he advanced next morning, Stuart found the
evidences of disorder so extraordinary that he could hardly believe
his eyes. He moved warily, suspecting a trap. The roads were
lined with sutlers' wagons, guns, and abandoned carriages containing
baskets with leftover, choice picnic fare. Prime muskets littered the
ground, along with blue jackets, knapsacks, hats, and caps scat-
tered helter-skelter. One lucky Confederate trooper picked up twenty
golden double eagles dropped, one by one, at intervals on a woodland
path. At Fairfax Court House the yard was filled with brand-new wall
tents; the building itself was heaped with clothing and sundry supplies.
By Monday afternoon, while bewildered Federal volunteers were
still arriving in Washington in abject disorganization, President Davis
and his Generals received exciting reports of the rout. It was more com-
plete and demoralizing than Davis had imagined. But both Johnston
and Beauregard were still opposed to a forward movement. After be-
ing hailed triumphantly for the victory of Manassas, they seemed to
dread risking a rebuff, despite the optimism of Stuart, James Long-
street, Jackson, and the President of the Confederacy. Johnston con-
tinued to plead the weariness of Ms men ? and now the water-soaked
126 JEFFERSON DAVIS
ground did render the movement of wagons and cannon extremely
difficult.
Had Davis himself been in command of the troops ; however, it is
probable that the hero of Buena Vista would have gone on to Wash-
ington. He understood the magic of morale. He knew, as did Joseph
Johnston's biographer Bradley T. Johnson, that when an army over-
comes or routs the enemy, "the courage, the enthusiasm, the high
spirit, the morale which the beaten army looses is attracted to and
absorbed by the victorious army." Since normally a pursuing army
should be more capable of supreme effort than a retreating one, Davis
believed that victors could march farther, fight harder, and exist on
scantier rations than losers. "But General Johnston," confessed his
admiring biographer, "did not know the enormous force of morale in
men, the prodigious power of enthusiasm." In any case, Johnston
assumed full responsibility for the delay and lack of action after the
First Battle of Manassas, and to the end of his life he continued
to be satisfied with the wisdom of his contention that the Army was
not prepared for an offensive movement.
If the Confederate troops had marched on, they would have found
much that they lacked laid out for them: guns and ammunition, shin-
ing new rifles, shoes, baskets of bread, and quarters of beef hanging
invitingly from tree branches above smoldering embers.
By approaching Washington via White's Ford, the Southern troops
could have avoided Federal gunboats down the Potomac. There were
indications that the Government would have fled at the Confederates'
approach. If Washington had been occupied, pro-South Maryland
would doubtless have been "liberated" from the Federal domain and
seceded; in which case both Kentucky and Missouri would have joined
the Confederacy. With Southern forces holding Washington, rec-
ognition in Europe would most likely have been forthcoming. And
with the strong antiwar element in the North daring to make itself
voluble, a peace giving the South independence might have been made.
So, at least, many thoughtful persons have argued. Whether the Con-
federates could have held Washington is highly doubtful. Yet, if the
violent rain had not come so providentially for the North, Davis might
have urged the gamble.
And how would the citizens of the District of Columbia have re-
acted to the coming of Confederates? A significant answer was given
by Colonel William Tecumseh Sherman shortly before he marched
off to Bull Run as one of McDowell's twelve brigade commanders. As
FANTASTIC ROUT
quoted in Lewis's biography, Sherman declared sharply to a group of
fatuous Congressmen: "The sentiment of the people of Washington is
such that they would cut the throats of our wounded and on the side-
walks with table knives, if our army should meet with disaster in their
neighborhood." While the Washingtonians were not as violent as
Sherman's own fiery disposition led him to suggest, the majority would
undoubtedly have rejoiced in helping to speed the parting Republicans
beyond their gates.
The victory at Bull Run, though decisive and important in both
its moral and its physical effects, had been dearly bought. On Monday,
the Confederates estimated that their casualties in dead and wounded
had passed 1,500. President Davis grieved in particular over two
deaths: that of General Barnard Bee, who had given Jackson his death-
less sobriquet of "Stonewall," and that of Colonel Francis Bartow,
his first Chairman of the Committee on Military Affairs.
Davis was told that as Bartow fell, he had called out with his dying
breath, "They have killed me, boys, but don't give it up!" His last
words contrasted sharply with those of a dismayed Union lad who ex-
pired on the field demanding to know "Christ! What is this all about?"
To some, those two cries from the heart symbolized the different atti-
tudes of Confederate and Federal soldier. The Southerner was fight-
ing for independence and in defense of his home from an invading foe,
as his ancestors had done in 1776.
In the afternoon, President Davis rode about with a guide to visit
the wounded in the temporary hospitals. A mortally hurt South Caro-
lina youth touched his heart by cavalierly quoting an old Latin line, "It
is sweet to die for such a cause." Because of disorganization of the
troops, it was dusk before Davis was able to find a young kinsman of
his, Private Edward Anderson, who he had heard was wounded. The
boy had died only minutes before he arrived at his cot. Someone told
him that when ambulance men had come to carry Anderson off the
field, the boy had pointed, though in agony from pain and thirst, to a
less severely wounded soldier nearby and said, "Take him. He may
recover. I can't."
When Davis returned to headquarters, his heart heavy with the
sense of suffering, he found quantities of retrieved booty. He noted
the disparity between the old-fashioned muskets of the Southern
soldiers and the Northerners' new-model rifles. The differences in
artillery were even more marked, not only in the number of guns that
128 JEFFERSON DAVIS
had been engaged, but in type. Captain W. N. Pendleton, the Episco-
pal minister whose battery was manned principally by young commu-
nicants of his Lexington church, had fought valiantly with light
smooth-bore guns against the enemy's long-range rifled cannon. The
spoils of victory were a bounteous windfall to the scantily supplied
Confederacy, which now added to its military stores twenty-six wag-
ons, sixty-four sturdy artillery horses, a field of tents, quantities of
clothing, and a supply of food, cooked and uncooked.
That evening of July 22, President Davis learned more details of
the fantastic rout. As the Union forces broke, they had fallen back to-
ward a creek called Cub Run, a mile beyond Bull Run. On the high
rolling meadows between the two streams, sight-seers from Washing-
ton had spread themselves in groups as at a jete champetre. United
States Senators and small politicians mingled with knots of newspaper
correspondents, including Henry Raymond of the New York Times
and William Russell of the London Times. Private citizens of Wash-
ington had come in their own carriages. A few adventurous ladies were
there with opera glasses, and some prostitutes of both first and second
category in filmy summer frocks. Mathew Brady, the famous photog-
rapher, was taking pictures, his black-curtained wagon full of equip-
ment for developing plates.
The crowd had had an exciting day watching the columns move into
battle, listening to the close-range thunder of cannon, and indulging in
all the spectator-sport sensations of a game hunt. Around two o'clock,
an officer had galloped up, waving his cap and shouting, "We've
whipped 'em at all points. They are retreating as fast as they can and
we are after them." The picnickers had cheered wildly. "Congressmen
shook hands with each other and cried out 'Bully for us! Bravo. Didn't
I tell you so?' " Or so William Russell was to report to London and
Jefferson Davis was to read some weeks later.
At the news of victory, Russell rode on horseback three miles nearer
to the battle. And then, when the dust of the road became so thick
that he could hardly breathe, he encountered returning wagons with
men in uniform running beside them. "Turn back!" they cried with
vehement gestures. "Turn back! We are whipped." Drivers of am-
munition carts going toward the battle endeavored to turn their
horses about on the narrow road. Men swore; horses plunged and
kicked. "The heat, the uproar and the dust were beyond description,"
Russell wrote, "and these were augmented when some cavalry soldiers,
FANTASTIC ROUT 12Q
flourishing sabres and preceded by an officer, who cried out c make way
there make way for the General/ attempted to force a covered wagon,
in which was seated a man with a bloody handkerchief round
his head, through the press."
When, around half past four, the holidaymakers on the green hills
beheld the Union Army in undoubted retreat, they rapidly harnessed
their horses and drove lickety-split to the Cub Run bridge. As the mass
of soldiers approached the bridge, an artillery shot struck a team and
wagon in the center of the bridge. In a few minutes, a traffic jam
blocked that narrow exit. Congressmen's landaus, army wagons,
horses pulling mounted cannon, ambulances bearing wounded, re-
treating men on foot all piled up against each other. Orders were
shouted; no one paid attention. As men yelled "The Rebels are com-
ing/' fluttery female screams rent the air. Panic seized the mob. When
the broken wagon and wounded horses were finally got off the bridge
and the vehicles got in motion, the panic increased. Congressmen were
as eager to get to the Potomac as the begrimed volunteers. Wheels of
vehicles became interlocked. Riderless horses trampled men who had
stumbled. The swirling dust half strangled the fugitives. With the
road choked, the mass exodus spread a hundred yards to right and left,
into fields and woods. A few officers courageously attempted to form
a resistant body of troops, but the men thrust them aside. A daring
American newspaper correspondent grabbed up a flung-away flag,
hoisted it, and patriotically called out for men to rally. He was
virtually stampeded, as thousands of soldiers ran by. Some frantic
chaps cut the harness of horses drawing carts and carriages, and rode
off on them bareback, leaving the stranded cursing. A bunch of un-
conscionable Zouaves from New York dragged the protesting, pleading
wounded from an ambulance and drove off in it themselves.
William Russell, who had been robbed of his gig, now realized he
was lucky to be on a horse. Seeing no necessity for the furious rush,
the Britisher pleaded with the men to stop and make a stand. When
they ignored him, he tried to shame them to some display of bravery.
A huge fellow by Russell's side, who was shouting "Run! Run!" as
loud as he could, seemed to delight in creating alarm. "What on earth
are you running for?" Russell demanded sternly in his British ac-
cent. "What are you afraid of?" The soldier, taken aback, stopped,
and eyed the Britisher disdainfully. "I'm not afraid of you," he said,
and, raising his revolver, deliberately aimed and pulled the trigger.
13O JEFFERSON DAVIS
Luckily, it did not go off. Russell spurred his horse and quickly lost
himself in the crowd. "There was nothing left for it," he wrote, "but
to go with the current one could not stem."
The distraught mass surged on, every man for himself, ignoring the
pleas of the wounded and those who fell out from exhaustion. At Cen-
treville, the exhausted General McDowell made an effort to halt the
fugitives, but the contagion of panic possessed them.
"The ground," Russell noted, "was now covered with arms, cloth-
ing of all kinds, accoutrements thrown off and left to be trampled in
the dust under the hoofs of men and horses. The runaways ran along-
side the wagons, striving to force themselves in among the occupants,
who resisted tooth and nail. The drivers spurred, and whipped, and
urged the horses to the utmost of their bent. I felt an inclination to
laugh, which was overcome by disgust, and by that vague sense of
something extraordinary taking place which is experienced when a
man sees a number of people acting as if driven by some unknown ter-
ror."
When the sun set, Washington was still some eighteen miles before
him. The moon lighted the road, and, as his tired nag trotted toward
the capital, he meditated on the account he was to write for the Times?
Not until the men were in sight of Washington did the mass hysteria
begin to subside. But they wanted to put the river between them and
the imagined pursuit of the Rebels. At Alexandria there was such a
rush of troops onto the decks of the riverboats that they came near
sinking. By midnight Russell reached his rooms. Immediately he
dropped into an exhausted sleep.
About six, he woke. Rain was beating with "a dull thudding sound
against the leads" outside his window. But, louder than all, he heard
a strange noise, "as if of the tread of men, a confused tramp
and splashing, and a murmuring of voices." From his window Russell
saw a steady stream of drenched soldiers, pouring irregularly, "with-
out a semblance of order," up Pennsylvania Avenue toward the Capi-
tol: "New Yorkers, Michiganers, Rhode Islanders, Massachusetters,
Minnesotians, mingled pell-mell together." Many were minus knap-
sacks, crossbelts, and firelocks. Some wore no shoes; a few were cov-
ered with blankets.
While the rain poured and the tramp of feet went on, the corre-
a Russell's story of the rout of Bull Run became such a famous piece of journalism
that he was given the sobriquet "Bull Run"; even after he was knighted, he was still
spoken of as "Bull Run" Russell.
FANTASTIC ROUT 13 1
spondent began writing his report. Now and then he lifted his eyes
from the paper and gazed upon "the beaten, footsore, spongy-looking
soldiers, officers and all the debris of the army filing through the mud
and the rain, and forming in crowds in front of the spirit-stores."
Later in the day, after some investigations, he wrote: "General Scott
is quite overwhelmed by the affair, and is unable to stir. General Mc-
Dowell has not yet arrived. The Secretary of War knows not what to
do, Mr. Lincoln is equally helpless, and Mr. Seward, who retains some
calmness, is, notwithstanding his military rank and militia experience,
without resource or expedient."
That night some gentlemen called on the Times correspondent,
bringing more news, confirming his impressions of the magnitude of
the disaster. "With the army disorganized, Washington rendered al-
most untenable," they declared that many thought the contest was
over. "The inmates of the White House are in a state of utmost trep-
idation," Russell commented, "and Mr. Lincoln, who sat in the tele-
graph operator's room with General Scott and Mr. Seward, listening
to the dispatches as they arrived from the scene of action, left it in
their despair when the fatal words tripped from the needle, and the
defeat was clearly revealed to him. . . . Why Beauregard does not
come I know not, nor can I well guess."
There was some similar thought in the mind of Jefferson Davis.
After supper on the night of the twenty-second, he called another con-
ference with Johnston and Beauregard to see if they had changed their
minds about a march on Washington. But they both agreed on their
inability to cross the Potomac. When Davis suggested an advance to
the south side of the river to push the invaders from Virginia soil,
Beauregard still insisted that at Arlington Heights they would en-
counter strong fortifications occupied by garrisons not infected by the
panic of the defeated forces. Johnston said the Confederates had no
sappers or miners, and lacked adequate excavating tools. Beauregard
described "wide deep ditches, with palisades, which would prevent the
escalade of the works." 4
In the face of his Generals' objections, President Davis did not use
his authority as Commander in Chief to press the issue. Anyhow, the
Confederacy was more or less committed to a defensive war. The con-
servative General Lee stood out at this time for defensive war only,
4 Instead of impregnable strongholds hedging Washington, which Beafcregard had
feared, General McCIellan, on arrival to assume command a few days later, declared that
he found only some "hasty entrenchments and a few detached works ... in no sense,
any general defensive line."
JEFFERSON DAVIS
as did Attorney General Benjamin. And, of course, invasion of the na-
tional capital at the outset might lose valuable friends in the North
and really "stir up a hornet's nest." So the President returned to Rich-
mond, as he wrote, "to employ all the power of my office to increase the
strength of the army, whether in offensive-defensive or purely defen-
sive operations on the renewal of invasion."
Loudest in denunciations of the flight from Bull Run were the very
Northern politicians whose blocking carriages had helped create the
stampede. In sentences as vivid as those in William Russell's brilliant
report to the Times, a humiliated Congressman from Ohio, A. G. Rid-
dle, wrote:
There was never anything like it for causeless, sheer, absolute, absurd
cowardice, or rather panic, on this miserable earth before. . . . The further
they ran, the more frightened they grew, and although we moved on as
rapidly as we could, the fugitives passed us by scores. We tried to tell them
there was no danger, called on them to stop, implored them to stand. We
called them cowards. . . . Put out our heavy revolvers and threatened to
shoot them, but all in vain ... a cruel, crazy, mad, hopeless panic possessed
them. The heat was awful although now about six; the men were exhausted
their mouths gaped, their lips cracked and blackened with the powder of
cartridges they had bitten off in the battle, their eyes starting in frenzy; no
mortal ever saw such a mass of ghastly wretches.
The whole North was stunned by the rout. An estimated one-fourth,
however, believing in the Tightness of the Southern cause and desiring
peace above everything, may have found some secret gratification in
the defeat. The Northern public had been led to believe that with one
decisive blow the Federals would wipe out all rebellious opposition in
the South. Only now was Mr. Seward willing to believe that the South
was serious about wanting independence. Mr. Lincoln realized that
something was started that would require all the country's resources
to finish.
Senator Wilson from Massachusetts, who was rumored to have
brought his dancing pumps with him so that he might be ready for the
victory ball in Richmond, was among the first dignitaries to reach
safety in Washington. Congressman Alfred Ely of New York was less
fortunate. Beaten out of a ride, he hid behind a tree, only to be cap-
tured by a Confederate sergeant named Mullins. Ely got the scare of
his life when he was haled, along with a Federal private and an escaped
slave, before a Confederate officer loaded with celebrating liquor.
"Whip the negro and send him back to his master/' the angry Captain
FANTASTIC ROUT 133
ordered. "Shoot the two Yankees." But the officer was not taken se-
riously, and Ely was sent as a prisoner of war to Richmond, where he
was to remain until Christmas. 5 They joked in Virginia that "the
Yankee Congress man came down to see the fun, came out for wool and
got shorn."
One Northerner, confessedly as frightened as ashamed, was a
Pennsylvania Democrat and Abolitionist named Edwin McMasters
Stanton, who openly blamed what he called the "national disgrace"
on the "imbecility of the Lincoln Administration." On July 26, Stanton
wrote former President Buchanan: "The capture of Washington
seems now to be inevitable; during the whole of Monday and Tuesday
[July 22 and 23] it might have been taken without resistance."
Unfortunate General McDowell, who had planned his attack well,
did not merit the censure heaped upon him by the very ones who had
forced him to fight before he was ready. He refrained from any attempt
to lay blame on others. But he was deeply disturbed to see Washing-
ton "full of drunken men in uniform" and his army so demoralized that
"its officers and men were leaving their camps at will." The Confeder-
ates would have found almost all the positions that commanded the
capital open for their occupation.
"Poor McDowell," wrote Russell to the London Times, "has been
swiftly punished for his defeat, ... As soon as the disaster was as-
certained beyond doubt, the President telegraphed to General Mc-
Clellan to come and take command of the army." With manly resigna-
tion, General McDowell accepted his removal from command.
Beauregard had been as lucky as McDowell was unlucky.
Manassas had been very nearly lost. A little more will to fight on the
Federals' part might have resulted in disaster for the South. Beaure-
gard's success had come, according to his biographer T. Harry Wil-
liams, "without his having done much to bring it about and even
despite grave errors on his part." e
Now General Beauregard had reached his zenith. The easy victory
at Sumter and the desperately fought one at Bull Run had catapulted
him to romantic fame. After July 21, 1861, however, he was not
to know refulgent success.
According to Frank Alfriend, onetime editor of the Southern Lit-
6 President Davis personally sent Ely some white blankets for his comfort when cold
weather came.
'Beauregard, as Williams says, in P. G. T. Becwregard, Napoleon in Gray, failed to
get his specific battle plans accepted by the Davis Administration <f because they were
nearly always unsound j and sometimes . . almost fantastic/*
134 JEFFERSON DAVIS
erary Messenger and Jefferson Davis's first biographer, the President
left the victorious Army "with a heart elastic with hope, at what he
considered the certainty of even more glorious and valuable achieve-
ment." But his heart was constricted, too, with the remembrance of
the dead young men who had gone to fight for independence so full
of Han. And now on the train with him returning to Richmond were
the bodies of General Bee and Colonel Bartow, who were to lie in
state in the capitol. It was something like his triumphant return to
New Orleans after the battle of Buena Vista with the body of his
boyhood comrade Henry Clay, Jr., in a pine box.
When the train reached Gordonsville, the Twelfth Mississippi Regi-
ment under Colonel Richard Griffith was lined up to greet the Presi-
dent. He addressed them as "Fellow Mississippians" and told them
how much he grieved for the relatives of those killed on both sides. As
a parting word, he impressed upon the regiment that they should al-
ways be kind to their prisoners. "Fight the enemy with all the power
that God has given you, and when he surrenders, remember, as South-
ern gentlemen, to treat the captured with courtesy and kindness." 7
That Tuesday evening at the Richmond station, an eager crowd
awaited the President. When the cheers subsided, he addressed them
briefly:
Fellow-citizens of the Confederate States:
I rejoice with you, this evening, in those better and happier feelings which
we all experience, as compared with the anxiety of three days ago. Your
little army derided for its want of arms derided for its lack of all the
essential material of war has met the grand army of the enemy, routed it at
every point, and it now flies, in inglorious retreat, before our victorious
columns. We have taught them a lesson in their invasion of the sacred soil
of Virginia. We have taught them that the grand old mother of Washington
still nurtures a band of heroes; and a yet bloodier and far more fatal lesson
awaits them, unless they speedily acknowledge that freedom to which you
were born.
Within the Spotswood, to welcome the President, were Cabinet
members and top-ranking military men. After embracing his wife and
the three children, he greeted his septuagenarian brother Joseph, his
sister-in-law Eliza, Joseph's nearly grown-up grandchildren, Lise and
Charles Mitchell, old family servants from Hurricane, various kin,
7 The record of this little impromptu speech was sent to Mrs. Davis at Beauvoir on
December 3, 1891, by William L. Allen, a member of the Twelfth Mississippi. The letter
is in Confederate Memorial Hall, New Orleans.
FANTASTIC ROUT 135
along with Mrs. Joe Johnston and Mrs. Chesnut. Unspoken pride
glowed on the distinguished face of Joseph Davis. He had not seen his
youngest brother since that February day that Jeff had set off in a
plantation rowboat, with a colored lad at the oars, to start for his inau-
guration in Montgomery. With his countenance now illumined by the
flush of victory, Jefferson looked to Joseph like an ideal President of a
republic.
Before the President had time to freshen up, a huge crowd in the
street began calling for him. When Jefferson Davis stepped through
the floor-to-ceiling window onto the little balcony, Joseph watched the
reactions of the people. The blaze of gas light from the fagade windows
and the sheen of the risen moon illuminated the scene like a stage set;
Joseph's old farsighted eyes could take in details. A deep hush fell
over the crowd as the President began to address them, "with thrilling
effect," according to Frank Alfriend, who was also watching the
crowd's reaction. "Mr. Davis recounted some of the incidents of the
battle, which he declared to be a decisive victory . . . and counseled
moderation and forbearance in victory, with unrelaxed preparations
for future trials. He spoke of the honored dead and words of conso-
lation to the wounded who had reaped a glory beyond the scars they
wore." And toward the close of his impromptu speech he uttered an
injunction that was to become famous: "Never be haughty to the hum-
ble, or humble to the haughty."
Joseph beheld the citizens listening with breathless attention to his
brother's words. "Old men leaning on staves stood up erect." Irrever-
ent urchins were motionless and wide-eyed. Color came back into the
pale faces of anxious women, and their tears dried. 8
An hour after his address, when the President was in the privacy
of his rooms, surrounded only by his family, rain began to fall in tor-
rents just as the first ambulance train from Manassas arrived. In
the driving storm, relatives and friends watched at the station, their
straining faces lit by the fitful glow of lanterns. As the stretchers were
removed and watchers saw the young men maimed and bloodstained,
their hair matted, their teeth clenched against agony, many broke
down and sobbed aloud.
The Southern casualties at Manassas were soon known to be greater
than had been estimated on Monday afternoon. Altogether they totaled
just under 1,900, of whom almost five hundred were killed. The Fed-
8 This account is vouched for by another eyewitness, T. C. De Leon.
136 JEFFERSON DAVIS
eral casualties approxmiated 1,500 dead and wounded, and 1,460 lost
as prisoners. 9
In the days immediately following, as more ambulance trains with
multilated burdens arrived, the women of Richmond took on roles as
nurses in the improvised hospitals. Some brought wounded strangers
into their own spare rooms to care for them. They little dreamed then
their services were to be required for four harrowing years.
Jefferson Davis was deeply grateful to the Richmond women, who
offered to serve long hours as volunteer nurses. "The exception," his
wife told him, "was a woman who did not nurse at some hospital."
Many who could not nurse carried baskets of delicacies to the hospi-
tals and denuded their summer gardens of flowers for the wounded.
Mrs. George Wythe Randolph, born an Adams in Natchez, was in-
sisting that the flowers as well as available medicines should be
"divided equally between the sick Confederates and the sick Federal
prisoners." According to the Englishwoman Catherine Hopley, at this
early stage of the conflict Northern prisoners claimed that "if they
had known how kind Southerners were, they could not have been in-
duced to enlist in a war against them."
Constance Gary, in Recollections Grave and Gay, wrote of her
aristocratic mother's devotion in tending the wounded: "Sleeping on a
soldier's bunk, rising at dawn, laboring till midnight, my mother faced
death and suffering with the stout spirit that was a rock of refuge to all
around her. Her record, in short, was that of a thousand other saintly
women during that terrible strife. How many dying eyes looked wist-
fully into hers; how many anguished hands clung to hers during opera-
tions or upon death-beds!"
As gentlewomen became familiar with the agony and the stench of
makeshift hospitals, so impressionable youths learned to face the grim
realities of battle. A young man named W. E. Winn of the Eleventh
Alabama wrote his sister in Demopolis from "Bull's Run" on August
7, 1 86 1 : "... It is astonishing how soon a man gets accustomed to
the horrors of such a scene. I, who at first disliked to look at a dead
body, could go through a field on which 4 to 5 hundred lay and take an
interest at that. I knew our troops had charged bayonets several times
and I wanted to see whether the enemy stood the charge." Young Winn
had picked his way among the moldering, still-unburied Union dead to
note which ones had bayonet wounds.
The historian Rhodes put the total Union casualties at 2,896, the Confederate at
1,897; tk us making one less than 1,000 in the South's favor.
CHAPTER XI
AFTER THE VICTORY, TROUBLES
MULTIPLY
IN THE SPOTSWOOD dining room, the President's table swelled
to plantation proportions. Besides his immediate family of five, there
were the Chesnuts and the young Joe Davises, old Joseph Davis and
his wife, Joseph's grandson, granddaughter, and son-in-law, Dr.
Charles Mitchell, two youthful relations of Eliza Davis, and "darling
Cousin Helen Keary, who had come to put herself under Uncle Jeff's
protection" while her captain husband was fighting. 1 It was hardly the
time for a family reunion, but that was what the family-loving Presi-
dent found thrust upon him, though he had virtually no time to be with
his relatives except at meals.
The third morning after his return, the President met Mary Ches-
nut in the corridor. Taking her by both hands, he said eagerly, "Have
you breakfasted? Come in and breakfast with me," Alas, she had al-
ready eaten. Then, laughing and^pressing his left hand to Ms breast,
he said in French, "I am disappointed, with all my heart." Mrs. Ches-
nut recorded in her diary: "Things must be on a pleasanter footing.
When he jokes it is a good sign." But she was distressed that Wigfall
had turned cool to the President.
On the night of July 26, Mrs. Davis had a select party in her hotel
drawing room, the last before the family moved into the refurnished
Executive Mansion. The new Secretary of State, R, M. T. Hunter,
was a guest, and Senator Robert Bamwell, to whom Davis had origi-
nally offered the post. Mrs. Chesnut pronounced the affair "brilliant,"
*Lise Mitchell's " Journal," which is now in the Manuscript Room of the University
of North Carolina Library, gives intimate glimpses of Jefferson Davis in July, iS6i.
Helen Keary was a {laughter of Jefferson Davfs*s brother Samuel.
138 JEFFERSON DAVIS
and found Mrs. Davis "in great form." Outside in the street, a crowd
gathered and began calling for the President. He went out on the bal-
cony to speak to them. "He is an old war horse/' Mrs. Chesnut wrote
affectionately, "and scents the battle from afar."
Colonel Chesnut also spoke. While he was giving the populace
thrilling descriptions of the Manassas victory, his wife demanded of
the company within: "Then why do we not go on to Washington?"
Someone answered, "You mean why did they not. The time has passed,
the opportunity is lost." "Silence!" commanded Robert Barnwell.
Hunter smiled obliquely at her, "Don't ask awkward questions."
To her diary, Mrs. Chesnut commented: "Everybody said at first,
Tshaw! There will be no war!' Those who foresaw evil were called
ravens, ill-foreboders. Now the same sanguine people all cry 'The war
is over!' . . . But the safe and circumspect say very little, but that
little shows they think the war barely begun."
The President's schedule was as crowded as in the critical days pre-
ceding the battle. He was in continual conferences with Generals Lee
and Cooper, Secretary of the Navy Mallory, and the new Secretary of
State. The first Secretary of State, Robert Toombs, had chosen to send
in his resignation on July 19, the day before Congress convened and
just as the battle at Manassas was about to begin. Toombs had not
waited to see whether England would recognize the Confederacy if the
advancing Federal forces were defeated. Since there was so little yet
in the way of diplomatic correspondence, he had chafed at having
nothing to do. And he could still hardly reconcile himself to playing
a lesser part instead of being President. His enormous energies and
ambition made him desire the laureled field of battle. In view of his
age and his overweight, Mrs. Toombs despaired of her husband's
being able to endure the rigors of camp.
Though aware of Toombs's military deficiencies, President Davis
felt the Georgian was too powerful in his state for his wishes not to be
respected, and, despite the family protests, he commissioned him a
Brigadier General. However, he gave just as few high commissions to
politicians as possible, for he feared their actual performance on the
field might cause mischief. In this respect Davis differed sharply from
Lincoln, who gave commissions to politicians right and left, and par-
ticularly to Democratic opponents, as he cannily said, "to keep them
from fighting me with their mouths."
Davis had persuaded Toombs to stay in office several more days
until Virginia's Hunter was familiarized with the work. Then the fat
AFTER THE VICTORY, TROUBLES MULTIPLY 139
Georgian donned his handsome new uniform. But his first chosen ap-
pearance as a soldier was not auspicious. At a celebration at the Fair
Ground, the President was to present a Lone Star flag to the Texans.
Mrs. Wigfall, accompanied by Mrs. Chesnut, bore the banner out to
the parade grounds in her open carriage, preceded by Mrs. Davis's
landau drawn by "spanking bays.' 7 The President, with Colonel Ches-
nut, Custis Lee, and some other aides, dashed by on horseback and
took their positions. Chesnut then rode over and received the flag from
Mrs. Wigfall, and bore it aloft to Mr. Davis. Hat off, the President
presented it with a patriotic speech to the Texans, commanded for the
day by Senator Wigfall. After replying, Wigfall maneuvered his com-
patriots briskly all over the field in the ninety-plus temperature. In
the midst of the mustering and marching, while flags flew, bands
played, and guns boomed, Robert Toombs made his entry on the pa-
rade ground.
President Davis saw what Mrs. Chesnut recorded:
That bold Brigadier, the Georgia General Toombs, charging about too
recklessly, got thrown. His horse dragged him up to the wheels of our
carriage. For a moment it was frightful. Down there among the horses
hoofs was his face turned up to us purple with rage. His foot was still in the
stirrup, and he had not let go the bridle. The horse was prancing over Mm,
rearing and plunging, and everybody hemming him in. We . . . expecting
him to be killed before our very faces. However, he soon got it all straight,
and though awfully tousled and tumbled, dusty, rumpled and flushed, with
redder face and wilder hair than ever, he rode off gallantly, liaving to our
admiration remounted the recalcitrant charger.
With misgivings, President Davis received the confirmed news that
George B. McClellan had been put in command of the Northern
forces. He could think of no better choice for a vigorous organizer and
administrator. In the meantime, Johnston and Beauregard seemed in-
different to taking advantage of the Federals 7 demoralization. General
Cooper had dispatched a trainload of fresh soldiers and further sup-
plies, which arrived at Manassas two days after the battle, to add to
the captured Federal guns, ammunition, wagons, and luxuries like
"fifty-two barrels of white sugar."
The mercurial Beauregard, who had proposed to dash up and take
Washington ten days before Manassas, when McDowell's men were
undefeated and their spirits high, had changed his mind. With Federal
forces routed and their morale now at an abysmal low, with the Con-
federates rich with reinforcements, newly acquired materiel, and food
JEFFERSON DAVIS
stores, Beauregard was not eager to advance even to the Potomac.
Frank Alfriend, editor of the Southern Literary Messenger, who knew
President Davis well, wrote: "He was far from approving the inaction
which followed Manassas. He confidently expected a different use of
the victory." Dr. McElroy, in 1937, maintained that military experts
have generally held the opinion "that a prompt and vigorous pursuit,
such as Davis had ordered, might have done much towards ending the
war."
The President was not at ease in his mind about Joseph Johnston
either. The General certainly knew logistics ; he was personally brave,
and highly esteemed by his soldiers. But for all his ambition, there
was an odd timidity and indecision about him that disturbed Davis.
Johnston had begun his services with the Confederacy by withdrawing
from Harpers Ferry and Maryland Heights, a move against which
"Stonewall" Jackson strongly protested. Davis knew the story that
went the rounds about Johnston on a bird shoot with Wade Hampton,
Hamilton Boykin, and some others. "Everybody liked him," Boykin
said. "But as to hunting he made a dead failure. He was a capital shot,
but with Colonel Johnston, the bird flew too high or too low, the dogs
were too far or too near. Things never did suit him exactly. He was
too fussy, too hard to please, too cautious, too much afraid to miss and
risk his fine reputation for a crack shot." While Wade and Boykin
plunged through mud and water, briers and bushes, shooting happy-
go-lucky, right and left, Johnston did not shoot at all. "The exactly
right time and place never came." 2
"Unless his ways are changed," the word came to Davis, "Johnston
will never fight a battle if he can avoid it. An accomplished soldier, he
is too particular."
Davis wondered if Johnston would ever find everything to his satis-
faction. How could everything be satisfactory when the enemy had
such enormous advantages in men and weapons? For the morale of the
Confederacy, Davis could not let it be guessed how grateful he was for
every single bullet picked up on the battlefield.
The Chief Executive could for the time being, however, sup and
sleep better. By the victory of Manassas, the South had been rescued
from the peril that had threatened it for weeks. Now the Confederacy
was obviously capable of fighting for its independence with vigor,
a In A Diary jrom Dixie, one of the sources of the above story, Mrs. Chesnut quotes
Boykin as saying that Joe Johnston was like his brother Sid, who "never in his life made
up his mind that everything was so exactly right that the time to act had cornel"
AFTER THE VICTORY, TROUBLES MULTIPLY
however poorly equipped. But the President reminded the South that
the incredible Federal rout might have its value for all, "because of
the lessons it contained as to the uncertainties of war and the morti-
fication that usually follows vain boasting."
One of the President's first acts after the Manassas victory was to
arrange for a special messenger to go immediately to London with new
instructions to Major Caleb Huse, who had been sent by the Ordnance
Bureau of the War Department to procure artillery, rifles, and mu-
nitions. Davis had a shoemaker sew the order between layers of one
of the messenger's boot soles. The order read in part:
You will disregard all former instructions and act in accordance with your
own judgment governing yourself by the condition of affairs as shown by the
newspapers or other sources of information and send forward supplies as
rapidly and as securely as possible. . . . You will not allow yourself to be
governed by the political agents of the Government, but act upon your own
responsibility.
As Huse was to write in 1889, "No better language could have been used
to excite a young officer to do his utmost."
On the Sunday following Bull Run, the churches of the South
were crowded with worshipers come to offer thanks for the Confeder-
acy's deliverance from the enemy. At St. PauPs in Richmond, the les-
sons and psalms were selected to suit the occasion, "the whole tenor
of the worship comprised in the words 'Give God the glory'." The
President occupied the pew set aside for him halfway down on the
right. As he came down the aisle with his family, he could not help but
notice the bandaged heads and sling-supported arms of the wounded,
who had personal as well as patriotic reasons for offering thanks. The
eyes of the parishioners naturally turned quietly to where he sat.
Among those present at that service on July 28 was Catherine Cooper
Hopley, a British subject, who set down her impression of Jefferson
Davis in Life in the South; From the Commencement of the War.
For the first time I had an opportunity, irresistible in spite of time and
place, of seeing and observing the new President of the Southern Confederacy.
Character is stamped upon every feature, A broad, full, prominent forehead,
nose somewhat aquiline, lips thin, firm and delicate. There is an expression
of gentleness, kindness and benevolence, but withal a touch of sadness with
the least shadow of bitterness melting into sorrow. But there is plenty of
resolution and dignity combined with conscientiousness, and you feel that
words from tiiose lips would not fall light and powerless. . . . Frequently
142 JEFFERSON DAVIS
he shared his book with his young son by his side, quietly pointing to direct
the eye, or guide him in the chants.
Jefferson Davis glanced at the pew designated for Robert E. Lee.
Wounded soldiers were occupying it. The President and his wife were
perhaps the only persons present who knew why General Lee, a most
faithful churchgoer, was not present. That morning he took the train
for Staunton in western Virginia "to perform his first field duty for
the Confederacy. 77 Lee 7 s departure from Richmond was inconspicuous.
He traveled with two military aides, Colonel D. C. Washington, in-
heritor of Mount Vernon, and Captain Walter Taylor, and two colored
servants. Their saddle horses were on the same train in a boxcar.
According to Lee 7 s biographer Burke Davis, the President "had
consented to allow him to go there in hopes of winning imperilled
mountain counties." General W. W. Loring, who had succeeded to the
command of the slain General Garnett 7 s forces, had bogged down in
inaction. His morale needed bolstering. And the two political Gen-
erals appointed by Lee, former Governor Henry A. Wise of Virginia
and former United States Secretary of War John B. Floyd, each hold-
ing small separate commands, were quarreling over strategic positions
and tactics.
Davis and Lee both thought that perhaps all the Confederate forces
in the area might be combined to strike a decisive blow at General
Rosecrans. The President hoped that by his military skill and in-
fluence over men, Lee would be able to retrieve the recent losses in the
region. Lee bore no written instructions. The President gave him carte
blanche to use his discretion. He was to co-ordinate forces and smooth
out rivalries. "The duty to which he was assigned/' Davis later wrote,
"was certainly not attractive by the glory to be gained or the ease to
be enjoyed. But Lee's wishes were ever subordinate to what was be-
lieved to be the public interest."
Fortune seemed to scowl on this venture from the outset. After Lee
left Staunton, where the railroad line ended, to proceed by horseback
to Monterey, in highland country, it began to rain. And it rained more
or less some portion of every day for three months. Letters to his wife
and children rarely failed to mention the rain. "Rain, rain, rain," he
wrote. "It rains all the time, literally. There has not been sunshine
enough since my arrival to dry my clothes. ... It is raining now. Has
been all day, last night, day before, and day before that too, etc., etc."
From Custis Lee, aide to the President, Davis heard indirectly of the
AFTER THE VICTORY, TROUBLES MULTIPLY 143
ordeal of rain, mud, and fog that the General and his men were under-
going.
Only four days after Lee had left Richmond, a letter from General
Wise, dated August i, arrived, in which he explained his recent
retreats in the Kanawha Valley. The last paragraph caused the Presi-
dent grave misgivings.
The Kanawha Valley is wholly disaffected and traitorous. It was gone
from Charleston down to Point Pleasant before I got there. . . . The
militia are nothing for warlike uses here. They are worthless who are true,
and there is no telling who is true. You cannot persuade these people that
Virginia can or will ever reconquer the northwest, and they are submitting,
subdued, and debased. I have fallen back not a minute too soon ... we have
worked and scouted far and wide and fought well, and marched all the shoes
and clothes off our bodies, and find our old arms do not stand service. I
implore for some (one thousand) stand of good arms, percussion muskets,
sabers, pistols, tents, blankets, shoes, rifles, and powder. 3
Everything in the letter, the President deemed discouraging. He had
been told in June, "Oh, let General Wise once appear among them
and the contemptible rascals will flock to him like wild pigeons."
Though Richmond had had great faith in the popular former Gover-
nor's power to encourage enlistments, he had won small support in the
Kanawha Valley. The region did too profitable a business with Cin-
cinnati, down the Ohio River; the pork packers of Cincinnati pre-
ferred Kanawha salt to any other salt. In Kanawha County, Davis
knew, eleven saltworks were in operation, making an aggregate of
1,500,000 bushels of salt a year. The Confederacy needed that salt, as
well as the products of five cannel coal factories, which together could
produce daily some 5,000 gallons of crude oil from bituminous coal.
Besides, there were valuable deposits of niter, essential for making
gunpowder, and even a little gold and silver in the region. It was im-
portant to hold the Kanawha Valley for its resources alone. If any-
one, Davis reflected, could inspire the people of western Virginia with
Confederate fealty it was Robert Lee.
At Monterey, ten miles east of the Allegheny's principal ridge, Lee
found Brigadier General Henry R. Jackson, who commanded that part
of the front. It was this cultured Georgian, Yale graduate, judge, and
former United States Minister to Austria, who had pressed Lee to
come to western Virginia and take direct command.
8 The full, long letter from Wise, which appears on pp. 1011-1012 of Official Records,
Series II, VoL I, ends that dosery printed volume.
144 JEFFERSON DAVIS
Lee found the Confederate situation in western Virginia more de-
moralized than he had suspected. The soldiers were in a sad plight;
measles and fever had brought down hundreds, and hospital facilities
were wretched. When Lee reached General Loring's headquarters, he
got a chilly reception. Unlike Jackson, Loring did not desire super-
vision. Loring, a precise man, was timorous about advancing on the
enemy until he had quantities of supplies stored at headquarters. To
Lee, as well as to Loring's staff and General Jackson, it was obvious
that a speedy movement against the enemy was necessary. But Lee
could not even succeed in drawing Loring into a frank discussion of
the situation. So he went on to Valley Mountain without any positive
information about the timing of Loring's probable advance. The other
officers regarded Lee as too gentle and too modest in dealing with the
obstinate Brigadier. The quality of diplomatic consideration that made
Lee beloved was sometimes a drawback when forceful, explicit orders
were necessary.
In the pouring rain on windy mountain trails, with a small staff, in-
cluding his strapping son Rooney, a cavalry Major, Lee did some
personal scouting. He learned that the Union forces in the Cheat
Mountain area were supremely confident; exaggerated estimates of
the Federal strength ran from 12,000 to 30,000.
As mud became deeper and mountain roads steep and treacherous,
Confederate mules died in harness pulling wagons loaded with flour
barrels. "Circumstances beyond human control," Lee wrote Rich-
mond, delayed the battle he was eager to begin. Davis, aware of the
difficulties, had General Cooper send Lee understanding and sym-
pathetic letters. But the President desired his confidential adviser to
come to the capital as soon as possible "after he had made the west
Davis's troubles were multiplying. Beauregard was one of his chief
worries. Before the week after Manassas was out, the General had
written to his friend Congressman Porcher Miles of South Carolina
that the fruits of victory were lost: Washington should have been oc-
cupied; Maryland, liberated. "From all accounts," he exclaimed,
"Washington could have been taken up to the 24 instant, by twenty
thousand men ! Only think of the brilliant results we have lost by the
two causes [food and transportation] referred to!" The blame for
his failure to advance on Washington he laid on the Administration
AFTER THE VICTORY, TROUBLES MULTIPLY 145
and particularly on Commissary General Northrop, who, he said,
would not furnish him with proper food; and he charged the Quarter-
master Department with not providing transport wagons. Having read
that all Washington wondered why Beauregard did not come, he was
intent on shifting the blame from himself.
To Congress, assembled in secret session, Miles read aloud Beaure-
gard's complaints. The President was asked if it were true there was
insufficient food in the Manassas area. Davis, astounded at Beaure-
gard's twisting of the facts, swallowed his indignation, and coolly re-
plied that the Commissary Department was functioning quite as well
as might be expected. The doings at the secret session leaked to the
press, as Beauregard had hoped. Shortly, the President was being
openly criticized for holding Beauregard back, with the implication in
some circles that he was jealous of the General's popularity.
Colonel Jordan, Beauregard's chief of staff, complained to Ches-
nut that Beauregard was "not properly seconded." Of course, Colonel
Chesnut well knew the truth of what had occurred that night after the
Bull Run rout, how the President had urged pursuit, how Beauregard
had seemed quite as opposed as Johnston to any further forward
movement.
Mrs. Chesnut caustically commented in her diary: "To think that
any mortal general (even though he had sprung up in a month or so
from Captain of Artillery to General) could be so puffed up with vanity,
so blinded by a false sense of his own consequence, as to intimate that
men would sacrifice their country, injure themselves, and ruin their
families to spite the aforesaid general. Conceit and self-love can never
reach a higher point than that! They give you to understand Mr. Davis
does not like Beauregard. . . . They say that rather than let Beaure-
gard make a good showing, Mr. President who would be hanged, at
the very least, if things go wrong will cripple the army."
The President, who already had enough burdens to floor a super-
man, was now confronted with the worst of liabilities: disloyalty and
calumny. Beauregard had a few powerful friends in the halls of Con-
gress, as well as in editors' chairs. The Confederate Congress, which
had apparently been heart and soul with Davis up to Miles's reading
of the Beauregard letter, began to reveal spots of antagonism. As Davis
told his wife, "Any man who has been in high public office is naturally
bound to have acquired some enemies." When she wanted him to reveal
the facts, he said that, for the health and harmony of the Confederacy,
146 JEFFERSON DAVIS
he was not in a position to defend himself openly. On August 4, the
President did write Beauregard a restrained letter, taking care not to
face him with his deceitful implications.
Some excitement has been created by your letters. The Quartermaster and
the Commissary Generals both feel that they have been unjustly arraigned.
As for myself, I can only say that I have endeavored to anticipate wants, and
any failure which has occurred from imperfect knowledge might have been
best avoided by timely requisitions and estimates. I think you are unjust to
yourself in putting your failure to pursue the enemy to Washington to the
account of short supplies of subsistence and transportation. . . . You will
not fail to remember that, so far from knowing that the enemy was routed,
a large part of forces was moved by you in the night of the 2ist to repel a
supposed attack upon our right, and the next day's operations did not fully
reveal what has since been reported of the enemy's panic. Enough was done
for glory, and the measure of duty was full. Let us rather show the untaught
that their desires are unreasonable than, by dwelling on possibilities, recently
developed, give form and substance to the criticisms, always easy to those
who judge after the event.
With sincere esteem I am your friend,
Jefferson Davis
The first week of August, a committee of townswomen announced
that everything in the Executive Mansion was in place; the President's
family could move in. For weeks, the committee had worked to select
furniture, draperies, and ornaments that would be worthy of such a
house. The Davises were touched that so much care for details had
been expended. The President was surprised to find a rich, cream-
colored carpet laid in his own private sitting room, though he won-
dered how it would fare when he received booted officers from the field.
After a fortnight at the Spotswood, Joseph Davis and his entourage
left for a short visit with Joseph's second-born daughter, Caroline
Leonard, at Norfolk. On their return to Richmond, Joseph suggested
that his family stay again at the Spotswood. Varina was not at all
averse to such an arrangement; she already had her hands full, man-
aging her own sizable household in a large house, where, although
hardly settled, she was expected to entertain informally every evening.
But Jefferson said firmly that unless his brother stayed at the Execu-
tive Mansion, he would move to the hotel with him. He wanted to as-
sure Joseph of his unflagging devotion, particularly since Varina had
often quarreled with him. Besides, he enjoyed his brother's conversa-
tion, and, furthermore, the distinguished-looking Joseph could act as
AFTER THE VICTORY, TROUBLES MULTIPLY 147
host when the President was too busy or too tired to see guests in the
evening.
Southern gentlemen in that hospitable age rarely had much con-
ception of a wife's trials and responsibilities. But simple Eliza Davis,
writing to a distant niece on August 10, gave some indication of Va-
rina's problems as well as an intimate sketch of the President,
oppressed as he was by mounting problems and feeling the return of
his old bete noire, facial neuralgia.
I long to be at home, as for health all places seem alike. My cough is
just the same. Varina has two servants sick and Fannie's maid is down.
Kitty [Eliza's maid] is complaining. I wish I had a healthy servant.
Varina receives every evening; sometimes the parlors are filled with
strange gentlemen and a few ladies. I go to my room generally early. Your
Uncle [Joseph] likes to see and talk to the people. He is very well. Mary
and Lise seem to like this place. Varina is very polite to them. . . . The
housekeeping is a trouble. One cannot get suitable servants, everything
double price. The children do not see, as I do, the worry or they would wish
to leave.
Last night Brother Jeff was quite unwell. He is better today. I never saw
a person so sadly changed. He rarely smiles, and has not spoken to me
except at table to hand something, although I sit next him. He looks as thin
as Sister Lucinda and very much like her. His hair is cut close. He has so
many callers lie cannot take his meals in peace. Varina is at times cheerful
and then again depressed. . . . 4
Eliza's description of her brother-in-law shows him as not always
making an effort in the bosom of the family to hide his worry. And it
may be noted that while it was the fashion for men to wear their hair
long, with beards of various trims, Jefferson Davis was then wearing
his hair short. Varina's hours of depression were perhaps due in part
to the fact that she was expecting a baby her fifth in December.
The President's grave mood in private was caused not only by fore-
seeing the criticism a high officer like Beauregard, aided by inimical
newspapers, could bring upon the Administration, but by his anxiety
over European recognition of the Confederacy. In London, William
Yancey, excited by the good news of Bull Run, had straightway ap-
proached Lord John Russell and again pleaded the case for recognition,
suggesting at the same time that England might raise the blockade to
obtain cotton. All the South was expecting some significant reaction
from Britain that would aid the Confederacy's cause.
letter was furnished the author by Joseph Davis's great-granddaughter, Mrs.
Mary Lucy O'Keley of Pass Christian, Mississippi,
JEFFERSON DAVIS
The crying need for war materials was never absent from Davis 's
mind. The pro-Confederate volunteers in Missouri had few arms ex-
cept squirrel rifles and shotguns. Though General Sterling Price pos-
sessed "an extraordinary power to secure the personal attachment of
his troops," he had only a few cannon, no shells, and very few solid
shot, but he made the best of rude devices: "Trace-chains, iron rods,
hard pebbles and smooth stones were substituted for shot."
On August 6, the President persuaded Congress to appropriate one
million dollars to aid the people of Missouri "in their efforts to main-
tain Constitutional liberty." Four days later, at Wilson's Creek, Na-
thaniel Lyon's Union troops met with a stinging defeat. The little
red-bearded leader, who had been largely responsible for preventing
Missouri's secession, fought gamely until he tumbled off his second
horse with a bullet hole near his heart. The news of victory reached
Richmond the day after Eliza wrote her letter.
For the President, another happy event of the week, besides the
success in Missouri, was the apparent reconciliation with Louis Wig-
fall, who had bitterly resented not being taken to Manassas. The Wig-
falls dined at the Davises on the twelfth, and the Wigfall girls spent
the night in the White House.
In the meantime, Lise Mitchell and the other young house guests
were enjoying themselves, particularly at Aunt Varina's evening re-
ceptions, where numerous youths in uniform called, some of them
Mississippi boys Lise had known. Jefferson Davis liked to have gay
young people about. He had been devoted to his great-niece since she
was a tiny tot, and he realized how much this social fling meant to her
after months of remote plantation life with aging grandparents.
But the President was really not well. He had been forcing himself
to go to his office despite recurrent blinding attacks of neuralgia. Yet,
in the midst of his pain, he was continually answering letters from
General Joseph Johnston, touching on such items as twelve-pound
howitzers, which the Chief of Ordnance, Josiah Gorgas, was making
at the rate of six per week. On August 16, Davis learned that 4,800 of
Johnston's immediate command of 18,178 at Manassas were sick
with measles, malaria, and typhoid. Many had just wandered off home
without leave, having decided that there was little more to fear from
the "Bull Running Yankees." That day the President's temperature
rose, and his physician insisted on taking him to a farm in the country.
Far from relaxing his efforts after the Manassas victory, as ignorant
or biased critics have charged, Jefferson Davis, even in illness, never
AFTER THE VICTORY, TROUBLES MULTIPLY 149
ceased to be concerned about the welfare of the Army. His doctor
could induce him to remain in the country but three days. On his re-
turn to Richmond, he wrote Johnston (August 20):
Frequent complaints have been made to me of improper food for the
well and a want of care for the sick. I most respectfully invite your atten-
tion to both these subjects and hope that abuses may be promptly corrected.
Is it not practicable to construct bake ovens at or near Manassas, that
good bread may be supplied to the troops?
The main complaint is of bad bread, and inattention to the sick. I have
repelled grumblers; but the clamor has increased in specifications until I
deemed it proper to obtain the facts from you. Captains and Colonels, in-
stead of correcting evils by personal attention, seem to have been the
sources of no small part of the impressions received and circulated.
On August 23, the President received with Mrs. Davis at her recep-
tion. He spent some time talking to Mary Chesnut, who was leaving
with her husband for South Carolina at the end of the Congressional
session. He told her that in the meantime she must make her husband
ride with him every afternoon. But in a day or two the President's phy-
sician ordered him to bed.
At the end of August, a supercharged situation created by John
Charles Fremont in Missouri added to the President's anxiety. This
daring adventurer, who had headed explorative expeditions across the
Far West in the 1 840*5, and earned his sobriquet, "The Pathfinder,"
had been sent, on the recommendation of the Blair clan, to St. Louis
as Commander of the Western Department. The first Presidential can-
didate of the Republican party and a onetime army officer who had
been dismissed from service for insubordination, Fremont was no
more to be bound by rules than by the winds. The new Major General
straightway declared martial law in Missouri and announced that
everyone north of the line of the Union Army caught with arms would
be court-martialed, and shot if found guilty. An avowed Abolitionist,
the Savannah-born Fremont threatened to confiscate all the property,
including slaves, of those who had taken up arms against the Federal
forces.
President Davis, like President Lincoln, learned of the Fremont
proclamation through the newspapers. Both were upset. Davis dreaded
a repetition of the tyranny in Maryland. Lincoln feared a disastrous
effect on Kentucky. On September 2, Lincoln wrote and asked
Fremont to countermand or modify his unauthorized order. "Should
JEFFERSON DAVIS
you shoot a man, according to the proclamation/' he said, "the Con-
federates would very certainly shoot our best men in their hands in
retaliation; and so, man for man, indefinitely. . . . The confiscation
of property, and the liberating of slaves of traitorous owners, will
alarm our Southern Union friends, and turn them against us perhaps
ruin our rather fair prospect for Kentucky.' 7 In a confidential letter
to his friend Senator Orville H. Browning of Illinois, President Lincoln
wrote that the Kentucky Legislature, which was in session, would not
budge until Fremont's proclamation was modified, "I think to lose
Kentucky is nearly the same as to lose the whole game," he said.
"Kentucky gone, we cannot hold Missouri, nor as I think Maryland.
These all against us, and the job on our hands is too large for us. We
would as well consent to separation at once, including the surrender
of this capital." 5
In the meantime, Fremont had offended the Blair clan by jailing
Frank, Jr., and airing his opinion that the youngest Blair was "un-
scrupulous, as well as a confirmed alcoholic." Lincoln sent Montgom-
ery Blair to St. Louis to investigate Fremont's conduct and cast an eye
on the group of sychophantic grafters that surrounded him. While
the Federals were feuding among themselves and the Abolitionists were
stoutly supporting Fremont, General Price was preparing to meet the
next attack. Jefferson Davis considered what the Confederacy could
do to help a state still in the Union,
6 The letter, which appears in Nicolay and Hay, Lincoln, Vol. IV, p. 422, is dated
September 22.
CHAPTER XII
THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN
JOHNSTON AND JOHNSTON
IN THE FIRST week of September, the President was seriously ill.
Mrs. Davis received Cabinet officers and callers and made quick de-
cisions as to who, if any, should be taken to his room. Many in Rich-
mond shook their heads grimly. Mrs. Chesnut's plain-spoken friend
Brewster bewailed: "The President is ill, and our affairs in the hands
of noodles. All the generals away with the armies, nobody here." But
although some Northern papers were reporting Jefferson Davis as
dying and others as dead, he managed to write a few "essential" let-
ters. On September 5, he answered General Johnston, who was request-
ing half of 20,000 soldiers that he mistakenly believed to be at Rich-
mond, Patiently, the sick President explained the Confederacy's grave
lacks.
You have again been deceived as to our forces here. We never have had
one fourth of that number. . . . We have been disappointed in our efforts
to get arms. Had you arms to supply the 10,000 men you want, they could
soon be had.
Lee is still in the mountains of Va. The rains have retarded his march,
or I think he would have beaten the enemy in that quarter. . . .
To permit the enemy to gain a success over any portion of the Army of
the Potomac would be a sad disaster, and I have done all that was possible
to strengthen you. . . .
My means are short of the wants of each division of the wide frontier
I am laboring to protect. One ship load of small arms would enable me to
answer all demands, but vainly have I hoped and waited. . . .
May God protect and guide you.
Your friend,
Jeffn. Davis
152 JEFFERSON DAVIS
In early September, Beauregard at length forwarded his report of
the Blackburn's Ford skirmish of July 18. It turned out to be an elab-
orate document of almost 4,000 words. (In Official Records, it takes
up seven closely printed pages.) Some newspapers praised it extrava-
gantly as "a model for all future dispatches." The President could not
help but smile at the Examiner's dissenting opinion of September 6:
"One of our contemporaries says that Gen. Beauregard writes like
Caesar. Did Caesar ever occupy all that space with accounts of a battle
in which fifteen men 1 were killed? Some fifty officers were mentioned
for compliment in this report, and four private citizens. At any rate, it
is feared that the value of official compliment will be cheapened."
On September 8, the President again wrote to Johnston, who was
now making vague overtures about an attack on Washington and per-
sistently demanding reinforcements. "We have no second line of de-
fense," the President pointed out, "and cannot now provide one. The
cause of the Confederacy is staked upon your army, and the natural
impatience of the soldier must be curbed by the devotion of the patriot.
. . . Had I the requisite arms, the argument would soon be changed.
Missouri and Kentucky demand our attention and the Southern coast
needs additional defense. It is true that a successful advance across
the Potomac would relieve other places, but if not successful, ruin
would befall us."
With the Confederacy's lack of arms, an advance was out of the
question. Davis was unwilling to tear away all his defenses at other
strategic spots in order to chance defeating McClellan's swelling
forces. Besides, he knew that the various state governors, who were
continually asking help for their special needs, would raise a terrific
clamor against any such drastic move.
The improvement of Jefferson Davis's health was speeded by the
arrival of his boyhood idol and admired friend, Albert Sidney Johnston
from California. In the fall of 1860, General Scott had summoned
Johnston to Washington and put him in command of the Department
of the Pacific. Before sailing from New York for San Francisco with
his wife, Johnston had manumitted his body servant, Randolph, who
thereafter was employed on wages and who followed his master de-
votedly until the General's untimely death at Shiloh. On April 10, 1861,
just before Sumter was reduced, Johnston, foreseeing a conflict, had
1 Perhaps more than thrice that Dumber were slain. Beauregard speaks of "sixty-four
corpses picked up on the field."
THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN JOHNSTON AND JOHNSTON 153
resigned his Federal commission and gone to Los Angeles, as a private
citizen on matters of family concern. In June, warned by his son,
William Preston, that he might be arrested if he returned by water to
New York, Johnston had set out across the continent on horseback for
Richmond. In the terrific heat of the summer solstice, he had plunged
into the desert and disappeared. Orders for his arrest were dispatched
from Washington. Davis heard that bets were laid as to whether or
not he would escape capture.
Under a burning sun, with scanty rations and a scarcity of water
that made death ever imminent, Sidney Johnston endured extraordi-
nary hardships. Once, he had to go seventy miles without any water
for his horse. But on this "pilgrimage of patriotism," his optimism,
courage, and power of endurance never flagged. Sidney Johnston "ran
the gauntlet" and took the rigors of the journey as stoutheartedly as he
might have done the day he was graduated from West Point,
The telegraph had finally announced Johnston's arrival in New Or-
leans. In Richmond, the President eagerly awaited him. On the morn-
ing of September 6, as Davis lay in bed, with the door of his upstairs
room open because of the heat, he heard a man's step in the hall be-
low. Sitting up, with a start, he exclaimed, "That's Sidney Johnston's
step! Bring him up!"
Davis received his old friend with inexpressible joy. Fifty-eight and
greying, Johnston was still a magnificent specimen of manhood: tall,
athletic, deep-chested, broad-shouldered, bronzed by the sun. Instead
of being haggard from his grueling trip, he looked remarkably fit. His
good qualities of heart and mind illuminated his countenance. Poised
and assured, without a tinge of conceit or self-seeking, he told Davis
he had come to accept whatever service was commanded of him.
Deputations from Memphis and other cities had already been to Rich-
mond asking that Johnston be assigned to command in the West. And
Johnston's West Point roommate, Bishop Leonidas Polk, now a Con-
federate Major General, had urgently made the same request in per-
son and by letter.
Only two days before, on September 4, General Polk, disregarding
Kentucky's neutrality, had sent troops to occupy and fortify strategic
Columbus, a little town high on the Mississippi River bluffs. By this
move, Polk thwarted General Ulysses S. Grant's intention to bring
gunboats down the river from Cairo and halted work on Union f ortifi-
cations across the water at Belmont, Missouri. Grant had retaliated by
154 JEFFERSON DAVIS
immediately occupying Paducah on the Ohio in Kentucky. The Presi-
dent knew that the situation in the West would soon be critical.
When Davis asked Johnston if he would serve in the West, John-
ston said, "Certainly, in what capacity?" "As commander of the De-
partment of Tennessee and Arkansas," Davis replied, adding that
western Mississippi and Kentucky would be included. Then he told
Johnston that he had already made him a full general, standing second
in rank after Adjutant General Cooper. His recommendation to Con-
gress, presented on August 31, had just been approved.
The President inquired about conditions in California. Johnston told
him that, after his resignation, numbers had flocked to him for advice
as to what Calif ornians should do in this national crisis. He had one
reply for all: "If you sympathize with either side, and feel the call of
duty to take part in a sectional war, go home, and fight there if nec-
essary. But here there should be peace. Strife here would be civil war
not North against South but neighbor against neighbor; and no
one can imagine the horrors that would ensue."
At intervals for three days, the two friends conversed on military
and personal affairs, as Davis later wrote, "with the freedom and con-
fidence belonging to the close friendship which had existed between
us for many years." Varina Davis remarked that she had rarely seen
her husband so happy since he had taken office. To a man as sensitive
as Jefferson Davis was to approval and affection, the appearance of
Sidney Johnston, radiating complete confidence in him as well as de-
voted loyalty, was like a revivifying tonic.
Davis unburdened his heart and spoke frankly of his problems,
the worst of which was the fact that no arms of any amount from Eu-
rope had yet been received. However, Caleb Huse reported that he
had a number of manufactories at work abroad, and Bulloch wrote
that ships for the Confederacy were being built. Critics were now
crying that inasmuch as the Confederates did not follow up the victory
at Manassas, it was "worse than a barren one," because the Federal
rout stimulated the Abolitionists to renewed effort. The United States
Congress had authorized the raising and organizing of 500,000 men,
while the South had no weapons for some of its regiments.
Davis had been depressed not only by the lack of war materials, but
by Beauregard's strange behavior. He was disappointed, too, that cir-
cumstances had so far made it impossible for Lee to accomplish any-
thing in western Virginia.
THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN JOHNSTON AND JOHNSTON 155
If Sidney Johnston were not so badly needed in the field, the Presi-
dent would have made him Secretary of War, and thus relieved him-
self of a tremendous strain. For Walker was resigning; the pressure
of office had been too taxing on him.
Leaving Jefferson Davis with lifted heart, Johnston set off for Ten-
nessee to organize an army and make the most of woefully inadequate
supplies. After his departure, Davis remarked to his wife, "I hope and
expect that I have others who will prove Generals, but I know I have
one, and that is Sidney Johnston."
Another visitor whom the President received during his convales-
cence was Eugenia Phillips, the beautiful wife of Philip Phillips, Jew-
ish attorney and former Congressman from Alabama. She had been
recently released from prison in Washington, and she told Mr. Davis
some of her experiences as a volunteer secret agent of the Confederacy.
Shortly after the victory of Manassas, she had been arrested as a spy.
While soldiers were searching every room in her house and turning her
dresses inside out looking for treasonable papers, her Irish cook had
craftily burned her private letters in the kitchen range. Mrs. Phillips,
whom the Davises had known as a social favorite in the capital, said
she was put in a filthy attic prison room in "surroundings appalling. 77
She told Mr. Davis that her frantic husband interceded with General
McClellan and begged the powerful lawyer Edwin McMasters Stanton
to use his influence with President Lincoln for her release. When
Phillips thanked Stanton for his help, the future Secretary of War said,
"Yes, Phillips, you may well call it a favor as none but yourself could
have tempted me into that den of infamy," and he pointed to
the White House.
General McClellan released her from prison, saying he did not want
to make war on women. And General Scott finally gave permission
for the Phillips family to leave for the South. They had sacrificed all
their household goods, "not even the wrappings of newspapers were
allowed." "But/ 7 Eugenia Phillips wrote triumphantly in her memoir,
"this did not prevent some very loyal Federal officers providing me
with traitor notes for Jeff Davis. 71 2
The day after reaching Richmond, Mrs* Phillips had unse^to the
notes from the linings in her corsets, and now She presented them to
* Eugenia Phfllips's memoir of her war experiences, which is in typescript in the
Library of Congress, is one of the most vivid and terrible accounts of the unhappy
period.
156 JEFFERSON DAVIS
the grateful President. A few days later, after a series of entertainments
by their old Washington friends, the Phillipses left to make their new
home in New Orleans, where Eugenia was to get into serious trouble.
The President shortly received another pressing letter from Gen-
eral Joe Johnston, who suspected that Beauregard at Fairfax Court
House was assuming too much power. With most considerate care,
the President attempted to reassure him:
You are not mistaken in your construction of my letters having been
written to you as the comdg. Genl. I have, however, sometimes had to repel
the idea that there was a want of cooperation between yourself and the
second-in-command, or a want of recognition of your position as the senior
and comdg. Genl. of all the forces serving at or near to the field of your
late brilliant achievements.
General Joe was not wrong in his surmise that Beauregard was act-
ing as if his were a separate command, without relation to the Com-
manding General, a few miles south at Manassas. Jefferson Davis had
to use all the tact he could summon to remind Beauregard that he was
second in command. Vital energy that the President needed for the
administration of the Confederacy was drained by his effort to keep
harmony between these two officers who fatefully held the prime
strategic positions of keeping the enemy from Richmond.
On August 31, the President had submitted for confirmation the
names and order of rank of the five officers who, under the act of May
1 6, he now made full generals. He had weighed carefully the qualities,
achievements, and relative ages of the five men. Since Lee was in fact
a few weeks older than Joseph Johnston, the order of rank of the top
five Generals accorded with their respective ages. Heading the list
was Adjutant General Samuel Cooper, who had held the same posi-
tion in the United States Army. Cooper's commission was dated May
16, 1861. The others followed in this order:
Albert Sidney Johnston, to rank May 30, 1861
Robert E. Lee, to rank June 14, 1861
J. E. Johnston, to rank July 4, 1861
P. G. T. Beauregard, to rank July 21, 1861.
> Congress confirmed the nominations without a protest.
When Joseph Johnston got the news on September 10, he was en-
raged. It was impossible for him to understand how Lee, or any of the
others, for that matter, should be ranked above him. Had he not been
United States Quartermaster General for a few months in 1860? In
THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN JOHNSTON AND JOHNSTON 157
vehement protest, Johnston sent the President a furious letter of some
i, 800 words.
Expressing his "surprise and mortification/' Johnston claimed that
the ranking violated both law and justice. In his sincere opinion, he
himself should have stood Number One. He spoke reverently of his
sword, which he had inherited from his father, disregarding the fact
that Lee had inherited his sword from that magnificent fighter General
"Light-Horse Harry" Lee. The Government, he charged recklessly,
"seeks to tarnish my fair name as soldier and as man." He went fur-
ther: "I now and here declare my claim, that not withstanding these
nominations by the President and their confirmation by Congress I still
rightfully hold the rank of first General in the Armies of the South-
ern Confederacies."
For two days, Johnston laid the extravagantly phrased letter aside
to cool before sending it. Then, as he later wrote in his Narrative, he
mailed it without making a change.
With astonishment and mounting indignation, Jefferson Davis read
the letter. It was not only bad-tempered, but an insulting reflection on
him personally. Though fully aware of Johnston's touchiness, Davis
could not have expected such an outburst. Yet he may have had some
disturbing doubt because of Johnston's apparent jealousy of Lee; for,
eight days after Manassas, Johnston had coolly informed Adjutant
General Cooper that he could not regard orders from General Lee,
titular commander in Virginia, because they were "illegal."
While McElroy claimed that Johnston was always "imperious and
unfriendly to Davis/' Douglas Freeman had the opinion that "at the
outset Johnston's manner had been friendly." As revealed in Davis's
dispatches and letters to Johnston, quoted in the Official Records and
in Dunbar Rowland's Jefferson Davis, Constitutionalist, the Presi-
dent treated him with the greatest consideration and a very special
tact. This one time, however, Davis did not write a lengthy letter,
explaining point by point, as was too often his wont. On September 14,
he answered Johnston with sharp brevity :
Sir: I have just received and read your letter of the 12th instant Its
language is, as you say, unusual; its arguments and statements utterly one-
sided, and its insinuations as unfounded as they are unbecoming.
It would have been more prudent if Mr. Davis had waited a couple
of days to reply and not let his own exasperation and indignation show
so patently, Johnston was more grieviously offended. And from this
JEFFERSON DAVIS
time forward, the President was to find Joseph Johnston the most dif-
ficult and troublesome officer to deal with in the entire Army. Resent-
ment against Davis burned in his breast like sulphur throughout the
war and to the end of his days. Many of Johnston's numerous friends
turned cold to the President and began sniping at him maliciously.
Virginia was shortly divided by a whispering, partisan controversy,
which involved two of her distinguished sons. 3
The majority favored Lee, but Johnston's adherents had powerful
social and political influence. John M. Daniel and Edward A. Pollard,
editors of the Examiner and friends of Johnston, led the anti-Davis,
anti-Lee faction. Unfortunately for the Administration, they were the
two most talented writers among the Richmond journalists. Black-
bearded, thirty-six-year-old Daniel, "chronic critic of almost every-
thing and everybody," except Joe Johnston, John B. Floyd, and the
right of secession, was a misanthrope of virulent passions. Pollard
was as unscrupulous as he was gifted. Davis's refusal to make these
Examiner editors his confidants had so alienated them that their early
laudation turned to rancor before he had been six weeks in Richmond.
Now they made it their aim to discredit the President and undermine
his prestige. 4
Robert Barnwell had declared to Mrs. Chesnut that the influence of
his cousin's Charleston Mercury had begun "this opposition to Jeff
Davis before he had time to do wrong." Daniel's Examiner, however,
went beyond Rhett's Mercury in seeking to damage the Administra-
tion. Because of its sprightly style and devastating sarcasm, the Ex-
aminer was avidly read by the soldiers in camp. As the two papers con-
8 In a letter to Judge James Lyons, personal friend of both Davis and Johnston,
Davis was to write, as late as August 30, 1878, that the complaint of his giving Lee a
higher rank than Johnston was quite absurd. "Of the two, General Lee had the higher
rank in the cavalry of the United States; had the higher rank in the Army of Virginia,
from which they came to join the Confederate Army, and was named first when both
were nominated to the Congress for commissions as Brigadier- General of the Con-
federacy. It is true General Johnston, as Quartermaster-General of the United States
had the staff commission as Brigadier-General. It is equally true that he was prohibited
by virtue of that commission from assuming command of troops.'*
4 During the four years in Richmond, President Davis never met Pollard. After his
malicious so-called Life of Jefferson Davis appeared in 1869, Davis Wrote to Thomas C.
Reynolds from Memphis on January 15, tSyo, commenting Oh a notice of Pollard by
the editor of the St. Louis Republican. "I never knew the creature personally," he Wrote,
"and only heard of him as a malignant who kept out of service by the exemption which
covered an associate Editor. So his false statements in regard to me individually may
have the palliation of ignorance." The letter, which is owned by the New- York
Historical Society, is quoted in full in Rowland, Vol. VII, p. 59.
THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN JOHNSTON AND JOHNSTON 159
tinued to sow seeds of discontent, they indirectly proved potent allies
of the enemy.
Varina Davis was much upset at "the carping and fault-finding" to
which the President was subjected. But when Davis's advisers were
to urge that anti-Administration papers be restrained, he would not
hear of it. As a democrat, he believed in maintaining complete freedom
of the press. Many others believed that in time of war he was carrying
democratic ideals too far in not clamping down on papers stirring up
doubt and disloyalty.
Despite the opposition of some newspapers and politicians, the
President had been remarkably successful in handling his Congress.
Bills for the complete embargo on cotton were wont to die in com-
mittee or never come to a vote because of the influence of the Presi-
dent, who thought it would be poor diplomacy to enact a law placing
an embargo upon cotton. Though the press, state legislatures, and
prominent public men were urging the Administration to take over
all the cotton in the South, Davis held out for unrestricted intercourse
with friendly nations.
On September 13, the British Consul in Charleston wrote Lord Rus-
sell that the Confederate Congress had left Richmond without pass-
ing the dreaded embargo act. But, as he pointed out, an act of Congress
was not really necessary, because "an embargo in actuality was really
the will of the people."
CHAPTER XIII
BEAUREGARD ROWS WITH THE
SECRETARY OF WAR
THE FATIGUED and disenchanted Leroy Pope Walker officially
resigned as Secretary of War on September 16. The President replaced
him with Attorney General Judah P. Benjamin, ad interim, since Con-
gress was not in session. Though an attorney, like Walker, Benjamin
had considerably more aptitude for military affairs. He possessed a
quick, incisive mind. Order was inherent in him, and he worked with
effective dispatch. He enjoyed excellent health. Nothing seemed to
fluster or frighten him. Criticism made no apparent dent in his imper-
vious armor of smiling amiability.
Davis was criticized for appointing a Jew to the most important
position in his Cabinet. There had been slight murmurings in March
when he had made Benjamin the first Jew ever to hold a Cabinet posi-
tion in America. Now some suspicious people raised the old scandal
about his being dismissed from Yale, when a teen-age youth, because
money and valuables belonging to other students were found in his
trunk. Davis, of course, ignored the mutterings. He knew Benjamin's
value both to the Confederacy and to him personally. And for once in
many weeks, the captious Richmond Examiner agreed with the Presi-
dent. On September 19, it spoke of Benjamin as "a man of most
varied ability, who has never failed to master any business he under-
took and whose wonderful capacity for work will qualify him for grap-
pling with the herculean labours of the office."
Benjamin, who was well to do, always managed to live in certain
style, surrounded by creature comforts. In Richmond, he had rented a
gentleman's three-story residence at Nine West Main Street. 1 Here he
x The house was only a few doors from the more imposing Glasgow home at One
West Main, where the distinguished novelist Ellen Glasgow was born and died. Her
160
BEAUBEGARD ROWS WITH THE SECRETARY OF WAR l6l
maintained bachelor quarters with his brother-in-law, Jules St. Mar-
tin, Congressman Duncan Kenner from Louisiana, and two other
friends. (His frivolous, unfaithful wife, whom he adored, had resided
in Paris for many years.) The house was about a mile from the Execu-
tive Offices, and the portly Benjamin enjoyed the clarifying exercise
of walking to work. He entertained well, and he kept a guest room for
visiting friends, among whom was Colonel Richard Taylor, son of
Zachary, who had a plantation in Louisiana. The President found it
relaxing and stimulating to dine occasionally at Judah Benjamin's,
where the atmosphere was cheerful and the cigars and wines of prime
quality.
As soon as the new Secretary took up his duties, the War Depart-
ment was invigorated. Davis found that Benjamin could dispatch
more business in an hour than many men could accomplish in a day.
And he liked his charming manners, his methodical habits, his atten-
tion to his duties. For the public morale, Benjamin beamed with con-
fidence, though when he took office the needed supplies for war had
been depleted and the expected arms from abroad had not arrived.
The President and his Secretary of War had respect for the intel-
lectual qualities of each other, Benjamin was certainly no "yes man,"
though the judgments of the two were generally in accord. When Davis
did not agree and Benjamin was overruled, the latter never sulked, but
smiled blandly. Though the tempers of the two men had once clashed
in the United States Senate in 1858, and Benjamin had challenged
Davis to a duel, they had become good friends. The cultivated Jew,
who refused to bemoan a failure or be upwrought at calumny, was a
soothing asset to the President, who could still be upset by unjust
criticism. In the few extant letters of Benjamin from England after the
war, he almost invariably spoke of Jefferson Davis as his "noble and
beloved friend."
When Benjamin stepped up to the position of Secretary of War,
Thomas Bragg of North Carolina became Attorney General. Bragg,
who had served his state as Governor and United States Senator, had
believed that political differences between the sections could be set-
tled within the Union, But when Lincoln called for troops from North
Carolina to coerce the seceded states, Bragg wholeheartedly sup-
ported the Confederacy. His appointment to the Cabinet was approved
throughout the South. Davis appreciated Bragg's logical mind and his
father was an official at the Tredegar Iron Works, The Glasgow house still stands, though
the house Benjamin lived in was long ago razed for <x>mmerdal purposes.
JEFFERSON DAVIS
"unpretentious dignity." They worked together in complete harmony
until Bragg resigned for unexplained personal reasons in March, 1862,
asking not to be renominated in the permanent Government. But he
and Davis remained the best of friends, and he was to render both
the President and the Confederacy more influential service in North
Carolina than he could have within the Cabinet.
On September 18, only two days after Benjamin assumed office,
Jefferson Davis received an imperative telegram from General Albert
Sidney Johnston: "Thirty thousand stand of arms are a necessity to
my command. I beg you to order them, or as many as can be got, to be
instantly procured and sent with dispatch." Such requests, and par-
ticularly one from a close friend, pained the President because of his
inability to comply. Benjamin regretfully telegraphed that he had only
2,500 rifles available, but that he was sending 1,500 to Johnston
"leaving one thousand for arming several regiments now encamped
in Richmond and who have been awaiting their arms for several
months. . . . We have not an engineer to send you." 2
In the meantime, President Davis learned that a big fight was shap-
ing up near Lexington, Missouri. General Fremont, to get back into
the Federal Administration's good graces, purposed to achieve a smash-
ing, decisive victory. Davis had ordered the onetime Texas ranger
General Ben McCulloch to cross the Arkansas border with Confeder-
ate troops and aid General Price in resisting the assault. Beginning
on September 18, fierce combat waged for three days. Price had bales
of hemp soaked in water and ranged in a line for breastworks. When
rolled before his advancing men, they formed "a moving rampart which
was proof against shot." As the hempen breastworks inched toward the
entrenched Federals, Price's small artillery kept up an effective fire.
Finally, in the afternoon of September 20, the Federals surrendered,
and the Missouri state forces took possession of Lexington. But the
success was short-lived; the Federals augmented their troops to an
estimated 70,000, and Price, unable to contend against such a force,
finally withdrew to the southwestern part of the state.
President Davis had another special problem. William Yancey, dis-
couraged by the official attitude of England toward the Confederacy's
commissioners, had sent in his resignation. After the spectacular Bull
a Fully one-half of Sidney Johnston's troops remained unarmed during the fall of
1 86 1. By the end of November, the enemy's force opposing Johnston numbered nearly
50,000. Johnston's, depleted by disease, numbered about 22,000.
BEAXJBEGABD ROWS WITH THE SECRETAHY OF WAR 163
Run rout, Yancey had written to Lord Russell and again stated the
Confederate case. While he did not press for immediate recognition,
he endeavored to combat the antislavery sentiment in England by em-
phasizing that slavery was no issue in the struggle. "It was from no
fear that the slaves would be liberated that secession took place/ 7 he
wrote. "The very party in power has proposed to guarantee slavery
forever in the States if the South would but remain in the Union." But
the strong point in his letter was the repeated invitation for England to
raise the blockade to assure cotton for its mills.
On August 24, Russell had replied that England must wait "until
the fortunes of arms or the more peaceful mode of negotiation shall
have more clearly determined the respective positions of the two belli-
gerents.' 5
Disheartened by the Foreign Secretary's note, Yancey decided to
resign his commission. His health was not good, and he resented being
snubbed by the British Cabinet, to whom the United States Minister,
Charles Francis Adams, had given strong hints that his Government
would take it in very bad part if England had any official relations with
the Confederate agents.
Jefferson Davis felt that Lincoln had made one of the wisest moves
of his career when, on Seward's advice, he had sent Charles Francis
Adams as Minister to England. This son of John Quincy was a gentle-
man of uncommon cultivation, who had enjoyed exceptional advan-
tages of travel and education. He had character and an adroit mind. In
the House of Representatives, he had struggled to avoid war. Though,
as Professor Randall wrote, he had been depressed at the nomination
of Lincoln, 'Sribora he never fully admired/ 3 Adams had accepted the
appointment, and he was to prove as valuable to the United States as
any Federal generaL
When Adams had arrived m the late spring of 1861, he had found
the atmosphere maifeecEly unfriendly to the United States. His son aad
secretary, Henry, wrer% "America can expect no sympathy or assist-
ance in Europe fetm any government. Thjey all hate us ajod fear us, JJ
The press, Ike the T^?per dasse% was predominantly and often elo-
quently pro-Soothem. Tfa& urbane Mr. Adams played Ms hand with
extraordinary skill. Although Russell had informally received the
Southern cotmnfesioiiers twice in early May, after Adams's arrival he
declined to gramt them interviews and requested that they put further
commumcatiom in writing.
Davfe accepted Yancey '$ resignation on S^>tember 23.
164 JEFFERSON DAVIS
He and Secretary of State Hunter had already conferred about the
choice of a man to take his place. They decided it would be better to
have a permanent representative at the court of England, of France,
and of Spain than to have the commissioners visiting the various capi-
tals at intervals. So Hunter wrote to Dudley Mann, dissolving the
commission and asking him to proceed to Brussels and establish his
headquarters there. Pierre Adolphe Rost was to go to Madrid. Two
new representatives would be stationed in London and Paris.
As the Confederacy's representative to England, Jefferson Davis
needed a man who could offset the diplomacy of the brilliant Charles
Francis Adams. Virginia's James Murray Mason seemed to him a
good choice. He was the grandson of the distinguished George Mason
of Gunston Hall, who had been a member of the Constitutional Con-
vention of 1788 and the author of Virginia's "Declaration of Rights."
The Mason family in Virginia, like the Davises in Mississippi, were
known for the more or less "ideal" conditions of their slaves. At the
end of the eighteenth century, George Mason had opposed the exten-
sion of slavery to the new states to be formed in the Southwest and the
Northwest, for the remarkable reason that "vulgar new people were
unworthy of so sacred a right as that of holding slaves."
James Murray Mason had served as United States Senator from
1847 to 1861, a period that coincided with Jefferson Davis's years in
Washington. Everyone who knew Mr. Mason attested to his fine quali-
ties. The London Times' s Russell thought the English would like him :
"a fine old English gentleman but for tobacco." Mary Chesnut was
among those whose first reaction to the news of Mason's appointment
was astonishment. "My wildest imagination will not picture Mr. Ma-
son as a diplomat," she wrote. "He will say 'chaw' for chew, and he
will call himself 'Jeems.' Over here, whatever a Mason does is right in
his own eyes. He is above the law." But later, after a small evening
party, Mrs. Chesnut recorded in her diary: "We all agree that we
adored Mr. Mason." "In the first place," she declared, "he has a noble
presence. He is really a handsome man, a manly old Virginian, straight-
forward, brave, clever, the beau-ideal of an independent, high-spirited
FFV. If the English value a genuine man they will have it." And so it
was to prove, socially, if not politically.
As a representative to treat with the wily Napoleon III, President
Davis selected John Slidell, New York-born citizen of New Orleans,
who had served eight years as United States Senator from Louisiana.
White-haired, urbane, subtle, and aggressive, Slidell, who spoke good
BEAUREGARD ROWS WITH THE SECRETARY OF WAR 165
French, was noted for his shrewdness and his political manipulations.
An intimate friend of Judah P. Benjamin, he was married to a sister of
General Beauregard's wife. He and his Creole lady welcomed the idea
of a year or so in Paris. Both Slidell and Mason accepted the commis-
sions and arranged their affairs in order to sail secretly for Europe
early in November.
In the meantime, Yancey, who had made an agreeable impression
in upper-class British society, stayed on in London awaiting his suc-
cessor and influencing opinion for the Confederate cause. He was ably
supported in his efforts by William S. Lindsey, a powerful radical
member of Parliament and the largest shipowner in Britain.
A fortnight after Benjamin was installed in office, President Davis
prepared to join Generals Johnston and Beauregard in a conference
at Fairfax Court House. During August and September, the Confeder-
ate outposts were at Munson's Hill, only six and a half miles from
Washington; with field glasses President Lincoln could behold the
Stars and Bars. 3 The Confederates, with their batteries on the south
shore of the lower Potomac, had blockaded the river so that commerce
could not reach Washington by water. McClellan was not yet ready
to fight. He was working with fierce energy to organize a mighty army
that would end the war quickly. The North trusted him implicitly,
People said he was going to march to Richmond when he was good and
ready and not when Horace Greeley told him to.
"Young Mac," so Jefferson Davis heard, rdde the streets of Wash-
ington as if a glory were upon him. He heard, too, that his onetime
young friend paid scant deference to Davis's old enemy General
Winfield Scott and that he even snubbed the good-natured Mr. Lin-
coln. But seemingly McClellan had the co-operation of everyone from
the President and General Scott down to the least volunteer. His of-
ficers were devoted to him. The men spoke of him affectionately as
"Our George." From the public came letter after letter calling upon
McClellan to save the country, hinting at the Presidency or a dictator-
ship. "He had," as Rhodes later wrote, "the sway of a monarch,"
The last day of September, President Davis went to Fairfax Court
House to consider the advisability of an offensive before winter set
in. Johnston and Beauregard received him with civility. He spent Octo-
*At the end of September, as thousands of volunteers poured daily into Washington,
Johnston deemed the position at Munson's HiTI too hazardous and withdrew to safer
ground.
l66 JEFFERSON DAVIS
ber i riding about the camps, observing. He was disappointed and
surprised to find that, despite frequent reinforcements, the effective
strength of the Army was little greater than on July 21. So many men
were sick; so many had died. Some were on lawful leave. Others had
just wandered off home. He was concerned about these stragglers. They
had heard that certain members of Congress, and notably Vice-Presi-
dent Stephens, contended that soldiers should be permitted "to go
home and attend to their private affairs while there were no active oper-
ations, and surely they would return whenever there was to be a battle."
The President heard complaints of the soldiers; the wish most gen-
erally expressed was that they be in regiments of their own home states.
He noted that "Mississippi troops were scattered as if the State was
unknown."
The evening of his first day in camp, Davis called a council of war,
which Gustavus Woodson Smith, third in command, was invited to
join. A towering Kentuckian, Smith had been graduated from West
Point in 1842, He had resigned as Street Commissioner of New York
City only in September, when he felt convinced that a majority in
Kentucky favored the Confederacy. The President had commissioned
him a Major General; the appointment seemed to please everyone,
including Joe Johnston and Robert Toombs.
Now, when McClellan had ringed Washington with fortifications
and inspired a greatly augmented army with soldierly morale, the Con-
federate commanders professed an eagerness to launch an offensive.
Davis thought their chances of success were only fractional compared
to the situation immediately after Bull Run. Yet he realized that the
Confederates were perhaps in a better position to fight now than they
would be in the spring after the demoralizing inaction of winter.
The newly arrived, aggressive Smith, a man "always determined to
impress/' seemed to lead the discussion. He said to the President:
"Can you not, sir, by stripping other points to the least they will bear,
and even risking defeat at all points, put us in condition to move for-
ward? Success here at this time saves everything."
Jefferson Davis pondered. He considered not only the appalling lack
of arms, but the score of strategic spots that would be endangered and
most likely lost if he ordered such a stripping as Smith suggested.
Each Governor felt that his state must be protected from invasion as
much as Virginia. Lamenting pleas came to Davis from the West for
supplies that would enable patriotic men to defend their homes. Pri-
vate arms of citizens had proved a sad delusion, and there was no
BEAUBEGARD ROWS WITH THE SECRETARY OF WAR 167
means yet of providing ammunition. General Albert Sidney Johnston
had only a small proportion of the war materials he vitally needed in
Tennessee and Kentucky.
Davis asked Smith for his estimate of men necessary for an offen-
sive. "Fifty thousand effective, seasoned soldiers. 7 ' Johnston and Beau-
regard both thought that 60,000 would be necessary, and they men-
tioned requirements of "large additional transportation facilities and
munitions." The supplies on hand, they maintained, were inadequate
for an active campaign in the enemy's country "even with our present
force."
Smith, who had been in uniform scarcely a fortnight, continued to
unfold his scheme. He wanted to cross the upper Potomac, occupy
Baltimore, liberate Maryland, cut off communications with Washing-
ton, force the Federal Government to abandon the Capital and whip
McClellan's army if it came out in open country against the Confed-
erates.
Jefferson Davis heard him out attentively. It was a bold plan and
one by no means a stranger to his own cogitations. But McClellan
was in command of at least 150,000 men, whom he was putting through
rigorous training. Even if Davis could give Johnston the minimum
60,000 he said he needed, the Confederacy lacked the armaments to
fight against such odds.
With deep regret, the President declared that the want of war ma-
terials made a big-scale offensive impossible. The Confederates would
have to remain on the defensive until arms arrived from abroad. This
defensive policy was not a mere policy; it was at this time an absolute
necessity.
The next day, the President took time to send a few reassuring lines
to Varina. He was careful not to reveal the extent of his discourage-
ment that so little had been accomplished in improving the strength of
Johnston's army.
I am quite well though yesterday I rode many miles visiting the en-
campments. Today if the weather permits I shall resume my labors and to-
morrow hope to return. Hourly I think of you & the children and seem to
hear my dear baby complaining as he did the evening before I left you.
There was a misunderstanding as to the selection of a house for me, but
Genl. Beauregard met me and took me to his Qrs. where I remain.
The condition of things here is not as good as I expected, and the position
has nothing except its comfort to recommend it. Kiss the children for me,
give my love to all the family and take to yourself Benjamin's portion.
l68 JEFFERSON DAVIS
Stonewall Jackson wrote his wife, Mary Anna, of the President's
visit. He had not heard he was coming, and was surprised to see him
drive up in an ambulance "with men cheering him along the way." The
next day, he watched Mr. Davis review the troops. "His voice and man-
ners are very mild," observed Jackson to his wife. "I saw no exhibition
of that fire which I had supposed him to possess."
On his return to Richmond, Davis was greeted with bad news. His
wife and Mrs. Joe Johnston had been overturned in their carriage.
Lydia's arm was broken. Varina had escaped with some bad bruises.
But since her baby was due in December, Davis was seriously con-
cerned.
Days before the President went to Fairfax Court House, the South-
ern papers had been telling their readers that an early engagement
might be expected. The ladies of the town were as impatient as the sol-
diers for action, and "were almost disposed to go themselves and take
Washington." Jefferson Davis knew of the public's anticipation, and
he regretted disappointing them. But he could not explain himself
without disclosing the Confederacy's glaring lacks.
Though enemies charged him with relaxing his military efforts after
"the council of war," the condition and morale of the troops were rarely
out of the President's mind. On October 16, he wrote Beauregard on
the necessity of reorganizing the Army. 4 The letter was written in the
tone of one baring deeply felt thoughts to a sympathetic friend. Beaure-
gard had observed the rule of keeping the Louisiana troops together,
and Davis urged him to do likewise with other troops, reorganizing
them as much as possible according to their state origins. This was
what he had learned the soldiers most desired.
I have thought often upon the questions of reorganization and it has
seemed to me ... it was desirable to combine the troops . . . with as
little delay as practicable. They will be stimulated to extraordinary effort
when so organized, in that the fame of their State will be in their keep-
ing. ... In the hour of sickness and the tedium of waiting for Spring, men
from the same region will best console and relieve each other. The main-
tenance of our cause rests on the sentiments of the people; letters from the
camp complaining of inequality and harshness in the treatment of the men
have already dulled the enthusiasm which filled our ranks with men, who
by birth, fortune, education, and social position were the equals of any
officer in the land. . . .
4 The original letter in Jefferson Davis's handwriting is in the possession of Charles
Dobbins, Washington, B.C.
BEAUBEGARD ROWS WITH THE SECRETARY OF WAR 169
Then Davis presented the picture of a commander that expressed
an ideal close to his heart.
The General being the remote commander of the individuals; charged
with the care, the direction, the preservation of the men . . . has time to
visit hospitals, to enquire into supplies . . . and the men come to regard
him, when so habitually seen, as the friend of the individual; but they also
know him in another capacity, and then removed, as it were placed on a
pedestal, he seems the power that moves and controls the mass. This is not
an ideal, but a sketch of Taylor when General of the Little Army, many
of whom would no sooner have questioned his decisions or have shrunk
from him in the hour of danger than if he had been their father.
It could hardly have occurred to Davis that, on the witness of his
own men, this might have been a sketch of himself as a Colonel in
Mexico as well as of General Zachary Taylor.
On October 19, the day after receiving this constructive, diplo-
matic letter, Beauregard withdrew his forces from Fairfax Court House
to Centreville without even informing the President of his move. Al-
most simultaneously, Beauregard demanded of the War Department
innovations like a special chief of ordnance for his own corps and a
"rocket battery company." The astute Benjamin, who had dubious
regard for Beauregard's judgment, questioned his going over General
Johnston's head. He politely informed him that he was overstepping
his authority. In fury, the Creole replied directly to the President, and
spoke contemptuously of Benjamin as "the functionary at his desk,"
who wrote him lectures on law "while the enemy is mustering in our
front."
On October 20, in answer to an insistent telegram and a feverish
letter, Davis, with inordinate patience, wrote Beauregard a long let-
ter: "I reply," he said in one place, "that your rank being of the highest
grade known to our service, is equal to any command. Your inquiry
must therefore be whether there be a distinction between an army,
and a corps d'armee; there is none in the law of our army organiza-
tion. . . ."
Davis then took occasion to speak of a matter about which he had
received countless protests:
Complaints are made to me of shocking neglect of the sick who are sent
down in the trains; such as being put in burden cars which have been used
to transport horses or provisions and into which the sick are thrust without
previously cleansing the cars, and there left without water, food, or attention.
These representations have been spread among the people, and served to
the ardor which has filled our ranks with the best men in the land.
17O JEFFERSON DAVIS
If such tMngs have occurred, surely others than the R.R. companies must
share the responsibility.
Your dispatch, I perceive, is dated at Centreville, and otherwise the news
has reached me that you had retired from Fairfax C.H. The enemy may
attempt to achieve something before the meeting of Congress. In this view,
I had contemplated an intrenched line which would compensate for our want
of numbers, and would be glad to have your conclusions upon that point.
That very same October 20, Beauregard wrote again, begging
Davis's protection from "these ill-timed, unaccountable annoyances"
of Benjamin, ironically disregarding the time-consuming annoyance
his self-absorption was causing the President. Davis wrote another
soothing letter to the angry General, gently reminding him that vic-
tory could only be achieved "by disregarding self and having zeal for
the common cause."
To make explicit the Administration's stand on command, orders
were sent from Richmond on October 22 announcing that the De-
partment of Northern Virginia was established, with Joseph E. John-
ston in command. There were to be three districts : the Potomac, com-
manded by General Beauregard; the Valley District, commanded by
Major General T. J. Jackson; the Aquia District, commanded by
Major General T. H. Holmes.
Beauregard was bitterly resentful of the new arrangement, which
so obviously marked Johnston as his superior. A few days later, he
made appointments of officers, which, the Secretary of War informed
him, only the President had the legal right to do. Now Beauregard ap-
pealed to Adjutant General Cooper, saying he resented the implica-
tion that he was a usurper. However, he stated boldly that he would
not hesitate to assume responsibility and leave it to those in authority
and to the country to decide whether he was right or wrong in his
conduct.
The President made a last effort to placate the self-assertive Gen-
eral, and at the same time to induce him to understand that he could
not act in disregard of Congressional enactments. He ended with an
appeal: "Now, my dear sir, let me entreat you to dismiss this small
matter from your mind; in the hostile masses before you, you have a
subject more worthy of your contemplation. The country needs all of
your mind and heart. . . . My prayers always attend you; and with
confidence, I turn to you in the hour of peril."
Thoroughly disgusted with BeauregarcTs limitless self-esteem, Ben-
jamin marveled at the President's enduring patience.
CHAPTER XIV
BALL'S BLUFF AND LEE'S
"MORTIFICATION"
PRESIDENT LINCOLN, too, was having his troubles. McClellan
continued to train troops while the North cried out for victories and
paid out money, as Secretary of the Treasury Chase estimated, at the
rate of $1,750,000 a day. "Little Mac" had assembled by mid-October
an army of approximately 160,000 men. 1 The total force under
Joseph E. Johnston's command was about 40,000.
Northern politicians had become extremely impatient with Mc-
Clellan. Three months had passed without a move. Though Mr.
Lincoln had no notion of rushing McClellan, who he claimed was cur-
rently far more important to the nation than himself, he was contin-
ually visiting him. William Russell wrote vividly of Lincoln's zeal at
this time. One October night when the Times correspondent called on
McClellan at his "usual time of return home," he was told by the or-
derly that the General had gone to bed tired and would see no one, not
even President Lincoln, who had been sent away only ten minutes be-
fore. "This poor President/ 3 wrote Russell. "He is to be pitied: sur-
rounded by such scenes, and trying with all his might to understand
strategy, naval warfare, big guns, the movement of troops, interior
and exterior lines, and all the technical details of the arts of slaying.
He runs from one house to another, armed with plans, reports, recom-
mendations, sometimes good-humoured, never angry, occasionally de-
jected and always a little fussy."
Among Lincoln's intimate friends who knew of his ardent desire
According to McCleflan's own figures, as quoted by Rhodes, the aggregate strength
of the Army of the Potomac on October 27 was 163,318. At the same time, Rhodes wrote,
Johnston's "total effective" force was 41,000.
171
JEFFERSON DAVIS
for a battle was Senator Edward D. Baker from Oregon, his "dear
Ned," for whom he had named his second son. Baker was now
a Colonel, serving under Brigadier General Charles P. Stone, who had
charge of protecting Washington. On October 21, 1861, Baker made
a bold, if inexpert, effort to cheer his friend.
On that date, as Jefferson Davis learned the following day, Colonel
Baker led his troops in flatboats and rowboats across the upper Poto-
mac at Ball's Bluff, Virginia, some thirty miles northwest of Wash-
ington, to a landing not far from Leesburg, where a small Confederate
force was concentrated.
When a Federal unit was thrown over the river at Edward's Ferry,
the Thirteenth Mississippi fell upon its men with gusto. As another
Federal brigade under Baker scaled the banks at Ball's Bluff, Colonel
Nathan Evans, affectionately known as "Shanks," sent the Seven-
teenth and Eighteenth Mississippi to beat them back. The Confeder-
ates attacked with such impetuous fury that the Federals were dazed.
Colonel Baker, who had unskillfully led his men, fell, shot through the
heart. At his death, panic seized his troops. They tumbled headlong
down the bluff, crowding into the boats in such numbers that some
sank. Many soldiers were drowned. Several hundred who could not
reach the boats surrendered. The Federal casualties in killed, wounded,
and captured, amounted to about nine hundred. 2 Among the seriously
wounded was a youthful Massachusetts Lieutenant named Oliver
Wendell Holmes.
Though the North claimed that the Confederates greatly outnum-
bered the Union forces, Jefferson Davis heard from his War Depart-
ment that "the loss of the enemy, prisoners included, exceeded the
number of Confederate troops in action."
Measured by other battles, the Federal casualties were small, but
the little disaster caused profound discouragement throughout the
North. No one was more depressed than Mr. Lincoln. The shock and
grief of war had struck home. The President was inconsolable over
the death of his friend Baker, and, as William Russell wrote, "walked
up and down his room for hours lamenting the loss."
In the eyes of the Republican Congress, the fiasco was particularly
depressing because it marked the first real clash since the Bull Run
rout. Although Baker's own rashness had been partly responsible for
the debacle, since he had exceeded his instructions in making "a re-
3 Bruce Catton gives the number of casualties as 900. Randall makes the total 921.
McClellan, in McClettan's Own Story, reports only 680,
BLUFF AND LEES MORTIFICATION
connaissance in force," General Stone was made the scapegoat. Stone
was already in bad repute with the Abolitionist Congressmen because
he insisted that fugitive slaves who came into his camp should be re-
turned to their owners, according to the law of the land. Charged
vaguely and fantastically with conspiring with Confederates, he was
subsequently imprisoned for a hundred and eighty-nine days and re-
fused the trial he pleaded for. 3
Jefferson Davis was proud of the Mississippi boys, who had fought
with as much ardor as had his own Mississippi volunteers at Buena
Vista. But he was shocked at the treatment of Stone, a West Pointer
of an excellent Massachusetts family. Here, Davis reflected, was a
flagrant case of defamation of character and atrocious injustice to ap-
pease wrought-up emotions. The crime against Stone may have re-
minded him of something William Russell had written the London
Times in August. One month after Bull Run, a general officer had
said to the correspondent: "Do you know, in this country, if you get
enough people to start a lie about any man, he would be ruined, if the
Evangelists came forward to swear the story was false. There are
thousands of people who believe that McDowell, who never tasted
anything stronger than a watermelon in his life, was helplessly drunk
at Bull Run."
During October, President Davis was acutely worried about the
situation in Kentucky. A letter he received from former Vice-President
John C. Breckinridge, who continued to hold his seat in the United
States Senate, was peculiarly disturbing.
In the House of Representatives it was declared that the South should
be reduced to "abject submission," or their institutions be overthrown. In
the Senate it was said that, if necessary, the South should be depopulated
and repeopled from the North; and an eminent Senator expressed a desire
that the President should be made dictator. This was superfluous, since they
had already dothed him with dictatorial powers. In the midst of these
proceedings, no plea for the Constitution is listened to in the North; here
and there a few heroic voices are feebly heard protesting against the progress
of despotism, but, for the most part, beyond the military lines, mots and
anarchy rule the hour.
Look now at the condition of Kentucky. . . . Look at the position of our
* Stone was never brought to trial, and not until February, 1863, was be allowed to
see a copy of tbe absurd charges against him. Though restored to command, with
apologies, his usefulness as an officer was hampered by the scandal. In 1864, a broken
man, he left the country and entered the service of the Khedive of Egypt.
1 74 JEFFERSON DAVIS
State under the rule of our new protectors. They have suppressed the free-
dom of speech and of the press. They seize people by military force upon
mere suspicion and impose on them oaths unknown to the laws. Other
citizens they imprison without warrant, and carry them out of the State,
so that the writ of habeas corpus cannot reach them. . . .
Hundreds of citizens, old and young, venerable magistrates whose lives
have been distinguished by the love of the people have been compelled to
fly from their homes and families to escape imprisonment and exile at the
hands of Northern and German troops, under the orders of Mr. Lincoln
and his military subordinates. While yet holding an important political
trust, confided by Kentucky, I was compelled to leave my home and family,
or suffer imprisonment and exile.
Breckinridge wrote specifically of the treatment of former Governor,
former United States Congressman Charles S. Morehead, who "with-
out indictment, without warrant, without accusation, but on the order
of President Lincoln, was seized at midnight, in his own house, and
led through the streets of Louisville . . . with his hands crossed and
pinioned before Mm . . . and now lies a prisoner in a fortress in New
York Harbor, a thousand miles away." "The case," Breckenridge de-
clared, "meets every element in the definition of despotism. If it should
occur in England it would be righted, or it would overturn the British
empire."
With heavy heart, Jefferson Davis finished reading the long letter
from the man who had run for President on the Democratic split ticket
against Mr. Lincoln. Such, he remarked sadly, was neutrality in Ken-
tucky. What could he do? He did not want the state of his birth turned
into a bloody field of civil strife, as Missouri had been. Besides, he had
no arms to send the Confederate sympathizers, whose committees con-
tinually begged for armed assistance. It looked as if Mr. Lincoln was
going to get Kentucky by whatever expedient was necessary.
Jefferson Davis, whose father had fought for independence from
Britain, was continually struck by the bitter irony of the North's de-
termination to suppress a proud people, to deny the Southern States
their right to freedom according to constitutional pledge. He felt much
as did a dismayed British observer, who wrote: "One can but wonder
that a people so full of admiration for liberty, a liberty which had
hitherto been the boast of the American Republic, should now be pros-
ecuting ... a war to quench that very freedom and independence
for which in their own case they fought so hard and long."
Davis often wondered how his old friend Robert Anderson could
stand the unhappy role he had been thrust into. Though Anderson
BALLS BLUFF AND LEES MORTIFICATION 175
still determined to try to keep Kentucky in the Union, Ms heart was
no more in recruiting troops to fight Southerners than it was in the
sending of "relief" ships to Sumter, against which he had manfully
protested. His health soon gave way. Reporting that he could not
longer endure "the mental torture/' at his own request Anderson was
relieved of his command. 4 He went to New York to live, and resigned
from the Federal Army in 1863.
William T. Sherman was sent to replace him. In conference with
Secretary of War Cameron in Louisville, the fidgety, high-strung Gen-
eral insisted that 200,000 men would be needed in the West for effec-
tive offense. Cameron thought the request "insane/ 7 and frankly said
so. The Northern papers shortly made such a to-do about Sherman's
mind being affected that he was removed from command of the De-
partment of Cumberland and given a subordinate position.
President Lincoln was having more trouble in Missouri than in
Kentucky. On October 24, he wrote out an order removing Fremont
from command in that state. Investigators declared that the Path-
finder was "incompetent, wasteful, extravagant, and under the influ-
ence of fraudulent contract manipulators." But Lincoln was viciously
criticized by the Abolitionists, who looked upon Fremont as their
champion. In Cincinnati, where there was a large German population,
papers reported that sober citizens pulled the President's portrait from
their walls and trampled on it. Determinedly, Lincoln had sought to
keep the slavery issue out of the war. None of his Cabinet was pushing
him in that respect. Four other Republican leaders, however, were
stanchly advocating abolition: Senators Charles Sumner of Massachu-
setts, Ben Wade of Ohio, and Zachariah Chandler of Michigan; and,
grimmest of all, Representative Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania.
Coincidentally with the removal of Fremont, Governor Jackson as-
sembled at Neosho, in southwestern Missouri, a rump legislature,
which passed an ordinance of secession on October 31. Though the
action had come too late to mean much, the Confederacy could add a
twelfth star to her banner. And President Davis was gratified by the
moral aspect of Missouri's belated action, which he hoped might have
some influence on the Northern peace party. Though fear of reprisals
kept Northern peace advocates largely under cover, the Confederate
Government had countless ways of knowing of their sympathetic in-
*The material in Official Records, Series IV, Vol. I, pp. 254, 296-297, is particularly
revealing of Anderson's distressing position. As soon as the war drew to a dose,
Anderson went abroad. He died in Nke, France, in 1871.
JEFFERSON DAVIS
terest. "The people would hail the return of peace with rapturous joy,"
wrote the Cincinnati Enquirer's editor, Washington McLean, to Sec-
retary of the Treasury Chase. "I assure you that nine-tenths of the
Democrats are at heart bitterly opposed to the war."
Jefferson Davis had been encouraged by something more promising
than Missouri's gesture of secession. In a speech at Newcastle, the
British Foreign Secretary, Lord Russell, had assured his hearers that
the American civil war did not turn on the question of slavery or on the
conflict between free trade and protection. One party, he declared, was
contending "for empire, and the other for independence." A separa-
tion, he believed, was "the only logical and permanent settlement of
the controversy." 5
The French Foreign Minister, on October 26, indicated France's
willingness to recognize the Confederate States if England would join
her. And on the thirtieth, Henri Mercier, French Minister to the
United States, tried to persuade Lord Richard B. P. Lyons, the British
Minister, to use his influence, for recognition. If England would
merely recognize the Confederacy as a nation, Jefferson Davis felt
that a prolonged and terrible struggle might be averted.
Things were not going well with General Lee in western Virginia.
On October 24, just three days after the Confederate victory at Ball's
Bluff, the inhabitants of the western counties voted to detach them-
selves from the old Dominion and establish the free state of West Vir-
ginia.
Though aware of serious obstacles in Lee's path, Davis had had
such strong belief in him that he expected success when Lee wrote that
the active campaign to clear Federal troops from Cheat Mountain
would begin about September 8. Richmond papers had reported that
Lee's battle plan had been received by the War Department and that
it was "brilliant." But nothing of importance had happened.
The cruel terrain over which Lee's troops marched became almost
impassable. Cannon had to be abandoned. Such torrents gushed down
mountainsides that the soldiers claimed they could not lie down at
night for fear of being drowned. A freezing cold enveloped the moun-
tain, but the men were forbidden to light fires, which would alert the
enemy. Lee himself wore all his winter clothes and his overcoat, and
'Russell's speech was quoted in the London Times of October 16. In an editorial
of September 19, the Times had written: "The watchword of the South is 'Independence 1 ,
of the North TJnion', and in these two war-cries the real issue is contained."
BALLS BLUFF AND LEF/S ^MORTIFICATION" 177
still could not get warm. He wrote his wife that he suffered keenly for
the greater miseries of the men.
The morning of the planned attack came thick with fog, but through
fieldglasses Lee could see the unsuspecting Federal camp. Everything
was in readiness. But the signal volleys from Colonel Albert Rust, who
had expressly asked to lead the attack, did not come. Hours passed. A
desultory firing from another sector alerted the enemy. Shortly, con-
fusion ensued. Lee himself ran into a Federal outpost and barely es-
caped with his life. The whole day passed without a word from Rust
as to why the attack on the mountain crest had not been initiated. Rust
had turned fearful because some captured Union pickets vastly magni-
fied the enemy's strength. Instead of attacking as prearranged or
when he heard the first firing, Rust kept silent in the woods, feeling
proud of saving his men from disaster. He claimed he had not under-
stood that his firing was to be a signal for the general attack and that
it should therefore be opened, whether it would be effective or not. His
timorous action probably cost a Confederate victory.
On September 17, Lee wrote of his "regret and mortification" at the
untoward events that caused his well-planned campaign to fail. When
the news of Lee's failure to rout the Federals reached Richmond, the
Dispatch of September 26 chided him with the reminder that "in
mountain warfare, the learning of books and of the strategists is of lit-
tle value."
Lee's attempt to gain the northern end of the mountain defenses
having ended fruitlessly, he moved south toward the Kanawha Val-
ley, where the feuding Confederate Generals Henry Wise and John
B. Floyd were opposing the Union forces commanded by General
Rosecrans. There was no agreement between the two former Gover-
nors of Virginia on strategic site or anything else; they had been con-
tinually bombarding the War Department at Richmond with com-
plaints of each other's bad judgment. And now, acting independently
of each other, they were encamped some distance apart.
On September 21, Lee arrived at Floyd's camp. He found little or-
der, no real organization in either Floyd's or Wise's command. No-
body seemed to know where anything was; no one understood his
duty; officers seemed as ignorant as men. Lee indulged in some mild
scolding of lesser officers, and the Confederates braced themselves to
meet the attack of General Rosecrans, who shortly drew up in sight
of the combined Confederate forces.
For a week, Lee waited on the alert. Then he informed General Floyd
178 JEFFERSON DAVIS
that he had begun to fear the enemy would not attack. "We shall there-
fore have to attack him/' he said. On the night between October 5
and 6, Confederate pickets heard the rumbling of artillery and supply
wagons and passed the word, "Here they come."
When day broke, however, a strange silence pervaded the mountains.
After facing Lee's entrenched camp for a week, Rosecrans had decided
against a fight and slipped away. The Confederates had delayed too
long. The reduced condition of artillery horses and the well nigh im-
passable roads made large-scale pursuit inadvisable.
Though General Lee stayed on in western Virginia for another fort-
night, the continual rains chilled initiative. The weather became so
bitter that he and Captain Taylor slept together under their combined
blankets. On the twentieth, Lee ordered Floyd to withdraw to a posi-
tion less vulnerable. The country Lee had been sent to save was now
left, with all its natural resources, to the Federals.
"Carrying the heavy weight of defeat," Lee returned to Richmond
on October 31 to report to the President. He was well aware of the
people's loss of faith in him. Davis had been shocked and pained at the
derisive newspaper epithets: "too tender for blood," "a showy pres-
ence," "a parlor and parade general," and, most stinging of all,
"Granny Lee." He received Lee warmly and commented admiringly
on the handsome white beard he had grown in the mountains. He let
the General know immediately that his confidence in his "ability, zeal,
and fidelity rested on a foundation not to be shaken" by the depre-
ciatory criticism of "the carpet knights who make campaigns on as-
sumed hypotheses."
With his characteristic self-abnegation, Lee did not attempt to de-
fend himself. He would not present an official report of their affair
on Cheat Mountain. Only in confidence did he tell the President that
if his plans and orders had been carried out, the result might well have
been victory. In secret, Lee confessed the difficulty he had had with
stubborn or careless officers. "He was unwilling," Davis later wrote,
"to offend anyone who was wearing a sword or striking blows for the
Confederacy." This too-great respect for the feelings of others was a
flaw in Lee's character that was to cause him trouble in future crises.
To get General Lee away from the critical atmosphere of Richmond,
particularly from the derisive stares and cutting comments of Joseph
Johnston's partisans, President Davis decided to send him at once to
Charleston to take charge of the coastal defenses of South Carolina
BALLS BLUFF AND LEES MORTIFICATION 1/Q
and Georgia. Besides being a trained engineer, Lee was considered by
Davis the best-equipped man in the Confederacy for the job.
Seemingly expecting a demotion, Lee asked just what his authority
would be. The President, surprised, reminded him that he was a Gen-
eral of the Confederate forces, standing third in rank, and that natu-
rally he would be in full command of the region.
On November 6, Lee took the train for Charleston. As a parting
thrust, the merciless Examiner wished Lee Godspeed, with the sneer-
ing hope that he would "prove more successful with the spade than he
had with the sword." As Douglas Freeman wrote, "Lee's first cam-
paign might have been his last, but for the faith President Davis had
in him."
On the first of November, five days before Lee left Richmond, Presi-
dent Lincoln had shown his faith in George McClellan by appointing
him General in Chief of the Union Armies to succeed infirm, aged Win-
field Scott. McClellan still retained personal command of the Army of
the Potomac. When Lincoln wondered solicitously if he had put too
great a burden on one pair of shoulders, Little Mac responded con-
fidently, "I can do it all."
CHAPTER XV
DRAMATIC ARREST AT SEA
AS ELECTION DAY for the President of the Confederacy, Novem-
ber 6, approached, Jefferson Davis could have wished more than ever
to be serving his country in the field, free from political responsibility
and annoying intrigues. His wife always regarded his acceptance of
the Presidency as his supreme sacrifice for the Confederacy.
Beauregard had created a new disturbance in his official report of
the Battle of Manassas, which had reached the War Department only
on October 17, though the 9,ooo-word document was dated August
26. President Davis first heard of it on October 29, when a Richmond
newspaper reporter wrote that he had "been favored" with a synopsis
of part of it, which purported to come direct from Manassas. In that
synopsis, Beauregard claimed that he had been overruled by Davis in
his plan for battle with the enemy south of the Potomac and for the
capture of Baltimore and Washington. His claim, which had nothing
whatever to do with the required battle report, was calculated to give
the impression that if Beauregard's design had been followed, the re-
sult would have been spectacular. The publication of the synopsis just
a few days before the scheduled Presidential election under the per-
manent Constitution accorded with anti-Administration press hints
that Davis had purposely kept the Army inactive since Manassas for
political reasons.
Some clerk at the War Department had neglected to forward Beaure-
gard's report to the President. When Davis got it now, he was amazed
and indignant. He wrote Beauregard: "With much surprise I found
that newspaper statements were sustained by the text of your
report. I was surprised because if we did differ in opinion as to
DRAMATIC ARREST AT SEA l8l
measures and purposes of contemplated campaigns, such fact could
have no appropriate place in a report of a battle; further because it
seemed to be an attempt to exalt yourself at my expense."
The President was astounded a few days later to read in the Rich-
mond Whig a letter from Beauregard addressed to the editors but ob-
viously intended for the whole Confederacy. It was extravagantly
headed: "Centreville, Va., Within hearing of the Enemy's Guns, Nov.
3, 1 86 1." Beauregard professed to regret publication of the synopsis
and hoped his friends would not be concerned at the slanders being
created about him. With a grandiloquent flourish he proclaimed, "If
certain minds cannot understand the difference between patriotism,
the highest civic virtue, and office-seeking, the lowest civic occupation,
I pity them from the bottom of my heart. ... I am not, and never
expect or desire to be, a candidate for any civic office in the gift of the
people or of the Executive."
On the eve of the election, Beauregard seemed to be announcing his
refusal to be drafted as President. Because of the theatricality and the
vain assumptions of his Whig letter, he lost prestige, and disgusted
even some of his good friends.
On November 6, for the first time, the Southern people chose their
President in accordance with their permanent Confederate Constitu-
tion. The mode of election was the same as that used in the United
States. But there was only one candidate. And, as the historian Rhodes
wrote, "One voice went up from all the States that Davis should be
chosen." While there was undoubtedly an anti-Davis faction, the tone
of the press bore out what William Russell had written to Senator
Sumner on September 5 : "The Confederates believe in no other man."
Despite rumblings against Alexander Stephens for Vice-President
because he was suspected of still being a Unionist at heart, he was the
Vice-Presidential candidate. Though Jefferson Davis took no pleasure
in having Stephens for a running mate, he expressed no objections.
When the electors from the various states met, a unanimous vote was
returned, Jefferson Davis was scheduled to be President of the Con-
federacy for the six years following February 22, 1862.
The day after Davis's election, as a coincidental celebration, Ms
college mate General Leonidas Polk defeated General U. S. Grant at
Belmont, Missouri, across the river from Columbus, Kentucky. Grant
was driven to his gunboats and back up the river to Cairo. But for his
intelligent, sure-footed horse, that slid down a cliff and negotiated a
angle gangplank on to the last gunboat puffing away, the General
JEFFERSON DAVIS
might have lost his life or been captured. According to a lively account
in Battles and Leaders, Grant "fled the field, virtually abandoning one
of his regiments, leaving his dead and wounded, a large preponderance
of prisoners, a stand of his colors, one thousand stand of arms, and
the caissons of his battery in the hands of the Confederates."
A few days later, as Davis was informed, Grant and Polk 7 with staff
officers, met under a flag of truce to discuss exchange of prisoners. At
the simple luncheon provided by the Confederates, one of the Federal
Colonels raised his glass to toast "George Washington, the Father of
his Country!" With a bright twinkle in his eyes, the fighting Bishop
quickly added, "And the first Rebel!" Caught in their trap, the Union
officers smiled sheepishly, and drank the amended toast.
President Davis was glad that he had another victory like that at
Belmont to mention along with Bethel, Manassas, Ball's Bluff, Wil-
son's Creek, and Lexington in his forthcoming message to Congress.
But that same November 7, the date of the Belmont victory, a Federal
flotilla of warships silenced the guns of the two forts that guarded
Port Royal, South Carolina, the finest harbor between Charleston
and Savannah. In the afternoon, General Lee arrived by special train
just in time to order the helpless garrisons to withdraw from their is-
land positions to escape capture or destruction.
When Congress convened on November 18, President Davis's ad-
dress was phrased to inspire confidence and hope in the people. Put-
ting the very best construction on dubious affairs, he could yet speak
without exaggeration of the year's abundant yield of agriculture. And
he emphasized an innovation in the Southern way of life: "The neces-
sities of the times have called into existence new branches of manu-
factures and given a fresh impulse to the activities of those heretofore
in operation."
At the end of his speech, he touched on the winter privations of Eng-
lish cotton-factory workers, which the British press prognosticated
feelingly. "While the war which is waged to take from us the right of
self-government can never attain that end," he declared, "it remains
to be seen how far it may work a revolution in the industrial system of
the world, which may carry suffering to other lands, as well as our own.
In the meantime we shall continue this struggle in humble dependence
upon Providence. . . . For the rest we shall depend upon ourselves.
Liberty is always won where there exists the unconquerable will to be
free."
That same day, although the northern part of Kentucky swarmed
DRAMATIC ARREST AT SEA 183
with Union troops, delegates from sixty-five counties in a rump meet-
ing passed a secession ordinance. So, before the momentous year of
1 86 1 closed, the Confederate flag claimed thirteen stars. Though, in
fact, Missouri and Kentucky remained divided in loyalties, having the
number of the original colonies was regarded as a happy omen.
Two days after Jefferson Davis's election, there occurred a dra-
matic event that almost brought Britain to war against the United
States. Some days before, a little boat called the Theodora, bearing
the new Confederate commissioners to Europe, had secretly slipped
out of Charleston Harbor through the Federal blockade and landed in
Havana. There Mason and Slidell had taken passage on the Trent, a
British Royal Mail Packet. In the Bahama Channel, around noon of
the eighth, the vessel was suddenly challenged by a United States war-
ship, the San Jacinto, which fired across her bow, following this with
a shell that burst just in front of her. The outraged British captain
stopped his vessel. Junior officers with armed marines from the San
Jacinto rowed over to the Trent. They said they had orders to arrest
Mason and Slidell.
Mrs. Slidell, who was on board with her daughter, preparing to make
their temporary home in Paris, asked who the San Jacinto^ com-
mander was. When told it was Charles Wilkes, whom she had met
socially in Washington, she exclaimed with a scornful little smile,
"He is playing into our hands!" The commissioners, with their pri-
vate secretaries, were forcibly removed from the Trent in defiance of
the warning protests of the British captain and the Royal Navy agent,
Commander Williams. As they were rowed away, Slidell called to his
wife that they would assuredly meet in Paris in sixty days.
When Jefferson Davis received the news in Richmond several days
later, he was indignant at the arrest of his emissaries. At the same
time, a hope welled in his breast that the event might at least bring
speedy recognition abroad. Davis was aware that Britain would
interpret the action of Captain Wilkes as an insult to her flag. In
formally announcing the seizure to Congress, he said, "The United
States have thus claimed a general jurisdiction over the high seas, and
entering a British ship, sailing under its country's flag, have violated
the rights of embassy, for the most part held sacred even amongst bar-
barians, by seizing our ministers while under the protection and within
the dominions of a neutral nation. . . . Had they been malefactors
and citizens of the United States, they could not have been arrested
184 JEFFERSON DAVIS
on a British ship or on British soil, unless under the express provisions
of a treaty according to the forms therein provided for the extradition
of criminals."
The entire Confederacy was thrown into a state of excitement al-
most as intense as that which raged during the Sumter engagement.
There was, as the perceptive Britisher Catherine Hopley noted, one
significant difference: Sumter "was the signal for war to commence
this raised hopes of its being brought to a conclusion" "For the
time nothing else was thought of and talked of but this 'unaccountable
act 7 , 77 she wrote in her journal. "Whenever a guest arrived it was the
first topic to be discussed; and the gentlemen stood rubbing their
hands with glee to think that the 'growl of the British Lion 7 would now
be heard to frighten the 'raving Yankees 7 into submission."
When the Trent finally reached England and the detailed news
came out, British citizens were as excited as the Southerners. Com-
mander Williams declared that marines with pointed bayonets had
rushed at Miss Slidell, who clung to her father, and that he had thrown
himself before the screaming young lady. London editorial writers
abandoned their boasted restraint and loosed tirades against the United
States. The Morning Chronicle declared: "Abraham Lincoln . . . has
proved himself a feeble, confused and little-minded mediocrity. Mr.
Seward, the firebrand at his elbow, is exerting himself to provoke a
quarrel with all Europe.' 7 The sedate London Times went further and
condemned "Yankees 77 wholesale. Captain Wilkes was called "the
ideal Yankee/ 7 "Swagger and ferocity, built on a foundation of vulgar-
ity and cowardice, these are his characteristics, and these are the most
prominent marks by which his countrymen, generally speaking, are
known all over the world. 771
William Yancey, still in London awaiting the arrival of his successor,
read the papers with gleeful optimism, and sent cuttings from them to
Richmond. The scent of war was unmistakable in the autumn fog.
British transports were readied; 8,000 crack troops sailed for Canada.
In the meantime, the North was cock-a-hoop jubilant over the Con-
federate agents 7 capture and their imprisonment in a Boston harbor
fort. Captain Wilkes, who had made the arrest, received extravagant
plaudits from the United States Government as well as from the pub-
lic. The House of Representatives honored him with a vote of thanks.
He was paraded along New York 7 s Broadway to a City Hall recep-
1 These two excerpts from contemporary London dailies are quoted in Carl Sandburg's
Abraham Lincoln to show the animosity engendered in England.
DRAMATIC ARREST AT SEA 185
tion. He was feted in Boston. "There is a storm of exultation sweep-
ing over the land," William Russell reported on November 18.
"Wilkes is the hero of the hour." Yet Charles Francis Adams, the wise
Minister to Great Britain, was convinced that Wilkes had done wrong;
he told Her Majesty's Government that he was sure his own Govern-
ment was not responsible for the high-handed act.
To Jefferson Davis, reading of the North's triumphant demon-
strations, "the outrage was the more marked, because the United States
had been foremost in resisting the right of Visit and search' and had
made it the cause of the War of 1812 with Britain." He pondered:
What would England do if the United States did not back down? How
could she avoid making some move that would benefit the Confeder-
acy's cause? For the rest of November and far into December, little
else was thought of or talked of in the South but the Trent affair and
the Yankees' dilemma.
On November 25, when the papers reported that a driving snow-
storm had struck Washington, Davis was relieved. He felt that Mc-
Clellan would surely not attack before spring. By then, the Con-
federacy would undoubtedly have some arms with which to meet the
offensive. When McClellan was stricken with typhoid early in Decem-
ber, Davis knew that the Republican Administration must give up
any attempt to take Richmond in 1861.
From the fifth to the tenth of December, while tension over the
Trent affair continued to grip both South and North, Richmond had
five days of surprisingly warm weather, with clearest moonlight. Log
fires and fur pieces were discarded. At night, Jefferson Davis could sit
on his long veranda with Varina, who hardly found a shawl necessary,
although she was expecting her baby any day. These were hours of
respite, of tender reminiscences, mingled with some apprehension of
the imminent family event and nostalgia for the privacy of their remote
plantation.
On December 16, at a ball given in Washington by M* de lisboa,
William Russell found Seward in fine humor. Cavalierly, he declared,
"If Great Britain forces war on the United States, we wifl wrap the
world in flames 1 No power so remote that she will not fee! the fire of
our battle and be burned by our conflagration." Russell was believing
that the Secretary of State really intended to show fight^ but a guest
who overheard the conversation told him it was "all bugaboo talk."
"When Seward talks that way," he said, "he means to break down. He
l86 JEFFERSON DAVIS
is most dangerous and obstinate when he pretends to agree a good deal
with you."
That same night of December 16, when Seward was threatening to
inflame the world, Varina Davis gave birth to her fourth boy child.
Despite her carriage accident in October, which had been a constant
source of concern to her husband, she did not have a difficult time.
Davis could never forget her near-death at the birth of Jeff, Jr.; and
he still believed that Seward's kindness in sending his sleigh with
Varina's nurse through the unprecedented snowdrifts of January, 1855,
may have saved her life. The President was pleased to have the baby
named William Howell for his ingratiating, ne'er-do-well, Northern-
born father-in-law, of whom he was really fond.
Varina was relieved to have the birth over before Christmas, which
in the hospitable South was a season of continuous merrymaking in
the homes. And she decided she must silence the unjust criticisms of
the Examiner by giving some large affairs as soon as she was strong
again. Social life at the Executive Mansion had of necessity been
greatly curtailed in September, by both the President's illness and his
absorption in pressing business; and, because of her accident in Octo-
ber and the approaching confinement, her physician had insisted that
she conserve her strength. Though all Richmond had known of her
enceinte condition, the Examiner's editors slurringly laid the blame
for the lack of entertaining, first, on the toploftiness of the "satrap"
Davises, and later, taking the tack that Washington critics had about
Mrs. Lincoln, suggested that Mrs. Davis was parsimonious and that
the President was "hoarding his salary."
After the birth of the baby, the President was in a sanguine state of
mind. No critical situation presented itself urgently on any of the war
fronts. Joseph Johnston's soldiers were settled for the winter in tents
or rude log huts with mud chimneys. Camp epidemics had subsided.
Scores of small manufactories had sprung up throughout the Confed-
eracy, not only for supplying materials of war, like the powder factory
at Nashville, but rude paper mills and factories for making cotton
cloth, caps, and furniture. The agrarian Southerners, who had bought
their merchandise from the North, were daily learning to be more re-
sourceful. Country people near the camps were induced to collect and
tan the cowhides lying about the fields, which were in turn sent to the
new shoe factories that made rough boots for the soldiers.
The cotton crop of 1861, needed by British mills, had been gathered
and stored on a voluntary unofficial embargo basis, awaiting England's
recognition. Unless the Confederate captives Slidell and Mason were
DRAMATIC AKKEST AT SEA 187
released very soon, England might actually declare war. All the for-
eign diplomats in Washington, as William Russell wrote, believed the
prisoners would not be given up. It was rumored that President
Lincoln said he would "rather die" than give them up. If he did not,
the British Minister, Lord Lyons, was prepared to retire with his
legation to Halifax.
With climactic news daily expected from England, the hopeful peo-
ple broke into cheers whenever Jefferson Davis appeared on the street.
He made a gallant figure on his thoroughbred from Brier-field; some
admirer declared that "he rode with a military air and bearing not
equalled by any of his generals."
In the week before Christmas, the President could give some de-
voted attention to his two little boys and the only girl. They were all
affectionate children, handsome little Joe, not yet three, most es-
pecially so. He would get "occasions of tenderness" while playing,
and run up and put his dirty little hands on either side of his father's
face to kiss him. Maggie, a highly intelligent child, considerate and
gentle, would sit for hours silently in her father's office when he worked
at home, blissfully happy just to be in his presence. Six-year-old Jeff,
Jr., though not so bright as his sister, was, in his frank mother's
words, "beaming, blustering, blooming, burly and blundering; the re-
pository of many hopes, promising but little definite yet." None of the
children hesitated to come into the drawing room if there was company,
and at the dinner table little Joe was accustomed to crawl up into his
father's lap during dessert.
On this Christmas Eve, Jefferson Davis could lay aside his cares.
Varina was up and buoyant, his children clustered about him, gifts
and loving wishes arrived from admiring strangers and long-time
friends. When Joe came to say his usual night prayer at his father's
knee, the President had his own special petition in this season desig-
nated for good will among men. He could wish devoutly that Eng-
land's imminent action might somehow lead to peace and assure the
South's independence.
Christmas Day in the Davis household began, according to custom,
with eggnog being passed around and the giving of presents to the
Negro servants in response to their cries of "Chrismas gifV After
attending a morning service at St. Paul's, the Davises received callers
all afternoon. Through the happy exchanges of pleasantries, however,
an underbidden of watchful waiting gripped at the President's con-
sciousness, for it was reported that a messenger from Her Majesty's
Government had arrived in Washington with a stern dispatch from
l88 JEFFERSON DAVIS
Lord Russell demanding the immediate release of the Confederate
commissioners and their secretaries.
On December 27, against all the predictions, Mr. Lincoln decided
to yield. Seward sent an archly courteous reply to the British Minister,
Lord Lyons:
The four persons in question are now held in military custody at Fort
Warren, in the State of Massachusetts. They will be cheerfully liberated.
Your lordship will please indicate a time and place for receiving them.
With the news of the United States's capitulation to Britain, the
protesting rage of many red-hot Northern patriots was explosive. Giv-
ing in to England's demands was a "pretty bitter pill to swallow," Mr.
Lincoln admitted to Horace Porter. J. B. Jones noted scornfully in his
diary: "Seward has cowered before the roar of the British Lion. . . .
Now we must depend upon our own strong arms and stout hearts for
defense." A pall fell upon the South. "It was little to be expected,"
Jefferson Davis remarked, "after such explicit commendation of the
act, that the United States government would accede to the demand."
Instead of helping the South, the Trent affair had actually re-
dounded to the North's benefit; for England, anticipating her own
probable war needs, had held up the shipping of arms, blankets, and
shoes sold to the Confederacy.
After the high-flaming hope of the pre-Christmas season, the fateful
year of 1861 sputtered out in a mist of gloom for the Confederacy. As
gold and silver disappeared from circulation, inflation mounted alarm-
ingly; prices had doubled in six months. The Southern railways could
not maintain their schedules; continual breakdowns occurred due to
lack of repair materials. The Federal blockade was closing in on South-
ern ports; incoming or outgoing shipping was risky business. There
was a scarcity of almost everything. Many items once considered ne-
cessities were not to be had at any cost.
When Congressman Ely, captured at Bull Run, was released from
prison the day before Christmas, he smiled at the crude brown paper
on which his passport was written. War Clerk Jones assured him that
Southern manufacture was in the process of improvement; the block-
ade, he maintained, might ultimately work to the mercantile North's
disadvantage. Ely pleasantly replied that he had no doubt "the South
would rise to the dignity of white paper."
The power of King Cotton had certainly not proved absolute in
1 86 1. England was apparently prepared to let her cotton-factory work-
ers wrestle with starvation rather than break the blockade or recognize
DRAMATIC ARBEST AT SEA 189
the Confederacy. "Did we not read/ 5 wrote Catherine Hopley, "of our
English poor being limited in their labours on account of the probabil-
ity of reduced importations of cotton? While the so-called slaves were
fattening on good food, and parading to their Sunday meetings in an
astonishing display of flounces, feathers, and shirt collars, were not
the legislators of my own honoured England experimentalizing on
how little it was possible for a man to live upon?"
When the year ended at midnight on December 31, the Richmond
Whig pronounced it "the most eventful of the present century." In the
life of Jefferson Davis, it had certainly been the most fateful. The job
of being President, which he had sought to avoid, partly because of
the miseries he had seen it bring upon his good friend Franklin Pierce
in peacetime, had already proved in wartime far more taxing than he
could have dreamed. His tribulations, however, were to be magnified
in the first half of '62. Glowing expectations were to end in ashen dis-
appointments; criticism and calumny were to be heaped upon him.
Nevertheless, as Davis now reflected, the year of 1861 had had its
bright aspects as well as its distresses. Though as yet unrecognized
by European powers, the Confederacy stood intact. The quick subjuga-
tion President Lincoln had expected was far from realized. The vast
Army of the Potomac was no nearer Richmond than it had been in
May. In the majority of battles, the ill-equipped Confederates had
been victors. No hint of the servile insurrection hoped for by some
Abolitionists had arisen; in general, the Negroes seemed as stoutly
"anti- Yankee" as their masters.
On the first day of January, a resplendent sun shone on Richmond.
The springlike morning was almost as balmy as it had been on Mr.
Davis's inauguration day in Montgomery. The President and his Lady
held a New Year's reception that began at eleven o'clock. For four
hours, Jefferson Davis, handsome and imposing, though extremely
thin, stood at the door of the main drawing room, greeting a contin-
uous stream of callers, giving them each a smile and a cordial hand-
clasp. Cabinet ministers, army officers, distinguished citizens, with
their ladies, and the general public circulated, while the Armory Band
made the Executive Mansion resound with music.
For all his disappointment in the year-end turn of events, Davis
would face 1862 with an outward show of indomitable confidence. As
to courage, that quality was so engrained in the fiber of his being that
he had only to open his lips to stir the people to a determination to
against in
CHAPTER XVI
'YOU REMEMBER THE MAN 3
THOUGH the Davises themselves could not entertain until Christ-
mas, that whole winter of 1861-62 in Richmond was socially gay.
The ebullient Virginia Clay punned, "For a few months, we revelled in
canvas-backs and green-backs, undisturbed by forewarnings of com-
ing draw-backs." "The three hundred," as she termed those in top so-
ciety, feasted on ducks from Chesapeake Bay, on prime oysters and
terrapin. When Senator Clement Clay and she left Huntsville, Ala-
bama for the capital, her ginger-colored maid, Emily, packed her eve-
ning gowns and jewels, despite her protest that they were going to war
and to nurse the sick, not to dress and dance. But Emily had been
right. Though Richmond women did their full share of nursing, sew-
ing, and knitting, Virginia Clay found that heroes on leave had to be
entertained and diverted.
A quantity of Southerners who had figured brightly in Washing-
ton society only yesterday were gathered in Richmond, and "unmeas-
ured hospitality" was the order of the season. While the President
lived with what Mrs. Clay called "an admirable disdain of display,"
Mrs. Davis was again "at home" almost every evening after Christ-
mas. Only tea and wafers were served, but guests were assured of a
warm welcome and a pleasant visit. If they came early enough, they
might meet the President, who would remain downstairs for an hour of
relaxation before beginning official labors that lasted far into the night.
At these informal "evenings," Mr. Davis said little, but let his wife
and her sister, Margaret Howell, lead the conversation. Margaret was
almost as witty and engaging a conversationalist as Varina. The Presi-
dent, like everyone else, appreciated her spontaneous bons mots and
epigrams "that went from court to camp."
190
"YOU REMEMBER THE MAN** 9
At Mrs. Davis's fortnightly "levees," the President usually
received with her. But he rarely appeared at social functions outside
his own house. However, he dined occasionally at the homes of two of
his Cabinet: Judah Benjamin and Stephen Mallory, the advisers with
whom he had the most business to discuss. Mallory was famous for his
punches and juleps; his Spanish wife was skilled in the Creole cuisine.
The Secretary of the Navy could appear heavy and dullish to those
who did not interest him, but to some "his wit was as sudden and bril-
liant as sheet-lightning," and he had a "power of summing up, when
he chose to exert it, both events and people, in a most amusing man-
ner." His adroit flattery to ladies added to his popularity.
Benjamin made himself agreeable to the tiresome as well as the at-
tractive. Never effusive, he breathed an air of placid bonhomie. What-
ever the opinion then of his conduct of war or foreign affairs, he was
a recognized success in society and his "soft, purring presence" was
quite as pleasing to the debutante set as to their elders.
Two other houses, besides Benjamin's and Mallory's, to which the
President sometimes went were, in a sense, social adjuncts to the Ex-
ecutive Mansion. One, directly across the street from the Confederate
White House, was that of Senator Thomas J. Semmes of Louisiana,
cousin of the Navy's daring Raphael Semmes. His beautiful and tal-
ented wife, Eulalie Knox of Montgomery, took some of the burden of
official entertaining off Mrs. Davis and would house distinguished for-
eign guests who turned up on business or out of curiosity. According to
the New Orleans Picayune, the Semmeses were so lavish in their hos-
pitality that in one year of the war they spent $30,000.
Another house that Jefferson Davis particularly favored was that of
Senator Semmes's sister, Cora, and her husband, Colonel Joseph C.
Ives, engineer aide-de-camp on the President's staff. In the years just
prior to the war, the Iveses were reputed to be the most popular young
couple in Washington, and there Jefferson Davis had known them.
Handsome, Northern-born Ives was a West Pointer who had been a
cadet at the Academy when Robert E, Lee was Superintendent. He had
resigned from the United States Army because of his Southern sym-
pathies, and Lee had promptly put him on his staff in Richmond. Then
the President had commanded his services and found Mm to be highly
efficient as well as personally charming. In the Iveses' Richmond home,
a series of long "colonial parlors" made the house ideal for large-scale
entertaining; and Mrs. Ives, who was an accomplished harpist, gave
frequent musicals and introduced "charade" parties for charity.
JEFFERSON DAVIS
Two other notable hostesses were Mrs. Robert Stanard, a widow,
and Mrs. George Wythe Randolph, whose husband was to succeed
Benjamin as Secretary of War. Mrs. Stanard, an exotic beauty with
both brains and wealth, made a specialty of "teas," at which broiled
chicken and hot muffins were served. Though she was bounteous in her
hospitality to vacationing soldiers, Mrs. Stanard attracted the intel-
lectuals and maintained something that resembled a salon, where
Judah Benjamin was a frequent guest and would give dramatic read-
ings. Mrs. Randolph, nee Adams of Natchez, had inherited a fortune
from her first husband. Her money and her wit, together with Ran-
dolph's prestige as a grandson of Thomas Jefferson, made her house
outstanding in Richmond society.
Though with many persons Jefferson Davis had the reputation of
being somewhat austere in society, others found him completely en-
gaging, "easy to approach and patient of woes of subordinates." At a
stag affair attended by all the officers of state, a representative of the
Charleston Daily Courier set down a vivid impression of Mr. Davis as
gracious host. After the presentations, the President moved freely
among his guests making pleasantries, exchanging reminiscences.
"You look, you listen, and you talk," reported the Courier. "Magnet-
ized by one of the most irresistible smiles in the world, charmed with
his language, and yet, involuntarily drawn into the expression of your
own sentiments, you soon forget that you are talking with the President
of the Southern Union, and remember the man."
Social life in Richmond came to a brief halt on January 18 with the
sudden death of former President John Tyler. Out of respect, all
scheduled social events were postponed. Taken ill at his Richmond
hotel, he died with a firm expectancy of the South's ultimate victory
and independence. Jefferson Davis, a long-time personal friend, was
grieved. He would miss Tyler's potent support in the incoming new
Congress. He could speak in heartfelt eulogy of the former President,
who was given the most impressive Southern funeral since that of John
C. Calhoun and was buried in Hollywood Cemetery close to former
President James Monroe. For Davis, Tyler's death marked the be-
ginning of a siege of troubles that crowded the weeks preceding his
inauguration.
In England, the effect of Lincoln's surrender of the Confederate
envoys was quite remarkable. Anti-United States talk ceased abruptly.
On New Year's Day, Mason and Slidell had been quietly delivered to
YOU BEMEMBER THE MAN 193
the British ship Rinaldo at Provincetown, Massachusetts. By the time
the envoys reached London, in late January, the dramatic incident
seemed to have disappeared from the British public mind. For the im-
mediate present, hopes of recognition vanished. Davis realized sharply
that for some time yet the South would have to fight out in sweat and
blood the bitter, unequal struggle.
When the hope of British intervention flickered out, Secretary of
State Hunter asked to be relieved of his office. He determined to stand
for the Senate. Sanguine about the South's ultimate success, the ambi-
tious Hunter aspired to succeed Davis as President of the Confederacy
in 1868. He feared his chances of election might be damaged if he re-
mained too closely attached to the present Administration, Davis was
reluctant to have Hunter leave the Cabinet. He liked him personally; 1
his work had been good; his reports and instructions to agents abroad,
cogent, clear, well-constructed. Yet, foreseeing from the complexion of
the newly elected Congress that trouble would be brewing, Davis be-
lieved that Hunter might prove more valuable to the Administration
as a leader in the Senate. And this was so. Hunter did support the
Davis policies until late in 1864, when he opposed the use of Negro
troops.
The story later concocted by Pollard of the Examiner that Hunter
resigned on the spur of the moment after Davis had allegedly rebuked
him sharply at a Cabinet meeting had no foundation in fact whatever.
Hunter's resignation had been planned 2 and discussed with the Presi-
dent. The Examiner itself, on January 8, 1862, came out against
Hunter's election to the Senate. An editorial questioned "his claim to
greatness" and charged that selfish ambition caused him to seek a
place in the Senate. Though the paper used its influence to try to
defeat him, on January 23, Hunter won by a huge majority, 140 to
24 votes. He continued to hold his office as Secretary of State until
February 18, four days before the inauguration.
In Washington, too, there was a Cabinet change. Simon Cameron
was removed as Lincoln's Secretary of War in January. Charged with
wanton extravagance in his Department and suspected of graft on
government contracts, Cameron was censured in the House. Though
personal corruption was never proved, President Lincoln dismissed
1 William Preston Johnston on January 9, 187$, wrote to Jefferson Davis: "I knew
Hunter was regarded as being in perfect accord with you. I have always heard you
speak of "hfm kindly even affectionately."
s Rembert W. Patrick, in his objective study of Jtferson Dwms and ffis Cabinet
(pp. 98-99), is gnligKtoning on Hunter's planned resignation.
194 JEFFERSON DAVIS
him rather curtly from his Cabinet, but softened the blow somewhat
by nominating him Minister to Russia.
Davis was surprised when Lincoln appointed his own most caustic
critic, Edwin McMasters Stanton, to succeed Cameron. Apparently
Lincoln was not indignant that Stanton spoke openly of "the painful
imbicility of Lincoln" and frequently referred to him as a the original
gorilla." William Russell of the Times regarded Stanton with dis-
taste: "He is excessively vain, and aspires to be considered a rude,
rough, vigorous Oliver Cromwell sort of man, mistaking some of the
disagreeable attributes and the accidents of the external husk of the
Great Protector for the brain and head of a statesman and a soldier. 77
Davis had no esteem for Stanton, whom he regarded as cold and un-
scrupulous, but he knew that Stanton was a shrewd lawyer and a man
of driving energy. As a Democrat, Stanton had been a flattering ad-
mirer of President Buchanan, who had appointed him Attorney Gen-
eral toward the end of his regime. Stanton, who had voted for John
C. Breckinridge for President, was to become the South 7 s most re-
lentless enemy.
Stanton had so flattered McClellan, that sincere "Little Mac" ap-
proved of his appointment as War Secretary. As soon as he was in
office, Stanton began to undermine the Commanding General. On Jan-
uary 27, 1862, spurred by Stanton, President Lincoln impatiently
issued War Order No. i, commanding General McClellan to advance
on or before February 22, the date scheduled for Jefferson Davis 7 s in-
auguration. But McClellan ignored the order. Happily for the South,
he was not ready to advance.
The last day in January, Jefferson Davis faced a crisis that shook
the State of Virginia: "Stonewall" Jackson was offended at Secre-
tary of War Benjamin and sent in his resignation.
These were the facts as the President heard them. In Winchester,
General Jackson, heading the Army of the Valley, had celebrated New
Year's Day by setting out in terrible weather to capture Romney,
thirty-five miles to the northwest, where 5,000 Federals were as-
sembled. Impeded by sleet, snow, and ice-caked roads, the movement
was painfully slow. Halfway to Romney, Jackson was irritated to read
of his secret plans in a Baltimore paper. On the fourteenth, the Con-
federates occupied the little town, from which the Federals had es-
caped scot-free. Jackson now proposed to take Grafton, seventy-five
miles farther to the west But his troops, some of them without over-
YOU REMEMBER THE MAN 1Q5
coats in the bitter cold, grumbled so at the winter hardships that he
gave up the idea. Leaving General Loring in disagreeable winter quar-
ters in isolated Romney, Jackson returned to Winchester. The men, ex-
posed to the dreadful weather without proper food or clothing, called
"Old Jack" crazy, and, as Frank Vandiver wrote, "began to lose faith in
their general."
By advancing, Jackson had placed on the alert defensive 18,000
Federals under General Stone across the upper Potomac. But Secretary
of War Benjamin received a letter signed by eleven of Loring's officers
asking that Romney be abandoned; the place was strategically un-
important and the men were suffering such discomforts that they
threatened not to re-enlist when their term was up. Loring sent a copy
of the petition by General William B. Talliaferro, who was going on
leave to Richmond, to be delivered in person to the President. Davis
surveyed a map of the region and was convinced that Jackson had
made a mistake. Sympathizing with the officers and the men, he called
Benjamin in conference. He suggested that General Johnston's opinion
should first be sought. Johnston himself had feared (as shown by his
correspondence with the War Department) that Jackson had "scat-
tered his forces quite too far for safety." Johnston informed Benjamin
that he was sending his acting Inspector General to examine the situa-
tion. But the Secretary of War did not wait for the report. He tele-
graphed Jackson : "Our news indicates that a movement is being made
to cut off General Loring's command. Order him back to Winchester
immediately."
Though Jackson complied, he smoldered with rage. On January 31,
he wrote Benjamin: "With such interference in my command I can-
not expect to be of much service in the field; and accordingly respect-
fully request to be ordered to report for duty to the superintendent of
the Virginia Military Institute at Lexington. . . . Should this appli-
cation not be granted, I respectfully request that the President will
accept my resignation from the Army."
Davis and Benjamin were both extremely upset. Joseph Johnston
wrote in a most conciliatory tone to the angry General. Numerous im-
portant persons, including Governor Letcher, begged Jackson to with-
draw his resignation, which would be "a calamity to the country and
the cause." State Comptroller Jonathan Bennett, good friend of Jack-
son, declared that the order of "Mr. Benjamin, the Jew," was "a most
remarkable specimen of indiscretion, lack of judgement, and disregard
of the courtesies." Claiming that it had met with almost universal con-
JEFFERSON DAVIS
damnation, he urged Jackson to remain in the service, because his name
alone was "worth ten thousand men." Jackson was pacified, and, most
fortunately, remained in service. Benjamin unhappily acquired new
enemies, and Jackson felt less kindly to the President.
Early in February, when the Confederates surrendered Roanoke Is-
land, North Carolina, to a Federal fleet and 12,000 soldiers under Gen-
eral Ambrose E. Burnside, Benjamin came in for more criticism. He
was not to blame. General Henry Wise, who had proved intractable
in the Kanawha Valley, was in command of 3,000 men at Roanoke.
He had repeatedly called for help from General Benjamin Huger, com-
mander at Norfolk, with whom he was not on the best terms. Though,
at Benjamin's order, Huger sent Wise powder from his own small store,
he would not endanger strategic Norfolk by releasing troops. When
Burnside attacked on February 8, General Wise, ill with pleurisy, had
to be carried to safety in a blanket. His popular and gallant young son,
Captain Jennings Wise, was killed, cheering on his men against the
overwhelming numbers. A much-publicized funeral at St. James
Church aroused all Richmond; the grieving father would not be com-
forted, and privately arraigned Huger and Benjamin for the "murder"
of his son as well as for the defeat.
Benjamin consulted with the President as to whether it was better
for the country that he submit to unmerited censure or reveal to a Con-
gressional committee the Army's poverty and run the risk that the
stark facts become known to the enemy. In the public interest, Davis
advised Benjamin to submit to censure, just as he himself had done
when blamed erroneously for not advancing on Washington after
Manassas.
Almost simultaneous with the loss of Roanoke Island, the President
received distressing news from the West. Just across the southern bor-
der of Kentucky the Confederates had erected two forts only twelve
miles apart to protect the state of Tennessee: Fort Henry on the Ten-
nessee River and Fort Donelson on the Cumberland. At the end of
January, the high command in Washington had ordered Ulysses S.
Grant to advance from Paducah, Kentucky, supported by gunboats,
and to invest first one fort, then the other.
In January, some Congressional Representatives of the Mississippi
Valley had requested that General Beauregard be transferred to the
West, where a crisis was shaping. President Davis was quite willing,
YOU REMEMBER THE MAN
and so was Beauregard, who was chaffing at being under Joseph
Johnston. Many of Beauregard's friends, like Roger Pryor, thought
he would have more chance for glory in the West. The General left
Virginia on February 2, and met Albert Sidney Johnston, his new supe-
rior, for the first time at Bowling Green, Kentucky, on the evening of
the fourth. Two days later, General Grant captured Fort Henry.
Fort Henry on the east bank of the Tennessee was poorly located,
weakly garrisoned. By the time Grant arrived, some of the batteries
were under water from the rising river. The commander, Brigadier
General Lloyd Tilghman, seeing he had no chance of saving the fort,
sent all but a few artillerists to join the forces at Donelson. Keeping
the enemy at bay until the escape of some 2,500 men was effected, he
surrendered the fort on February 6. The Tennessee River was open
now for Federal gunboats to steam southward to the northwest corner
of Alabama.
The news was not only disturbing to President Davis, but caused
dismay to Albert Sidney Johnston, who commanded the West and
whose headquarters had been at Bowling Green, Kentucky, since Octo-
ber. Johnston, poorly equipped, with hardly a third of the men the
public thought he possessed, had to guard against two formidable
armies : General Don Carlos BuelPs, at Louisville, and Grant's, which
now started moving against Donelson. Johnston determined to fight
for Nashville at Donelson, and gave 16,000 of his force to the fort's
defense, keeping only 14,000 at Bowling Green to oppose Buell. His
judgment was good, but he was unfortunate in having inept top gen-
erals at Donelson: former Secretary of War Floyd and Gideon Pillow,
a Mexican War veteran.
After Grant had taken Fort Henry, he wired General Henry W.
Halleck that he would destroy Fort Donelson on the eighth. But he did
not reach Donelson, twelve miles away, until the twelfth. The Fed-
eral gunboats were at first so thoroughly repulsed that the Confeder-
ates thought they had won a victory.
Then reinforcements arrived to swell Grant's army to 27,000. On
the night of the fourteenth, a blizzard blew down out of the northwest,
making life a hell for both armies. On the fifteenth, with gunboats
pouring shot into the fort from the river and Grant's forces attacking
from the land side, the Confederates decided to cut their way out. In
a bloody fight in the new-f alien snow, the Confederates drove back the
Union infantry, got control of the Nashville road, and had a
198 JEFFERSON DAVIS
clear chance to escape. Then Floyd and Pillow floundered, lost sense
of reality, and in confusion withdrew back into the fort. By nightfall,
Union troops had regained the road to Nashville.
At midnight, the top Confederate officers held a dismal council of
war, to which they invited Colonel Nathan Bedford Forrest. The
Cavalry commander had scouted and found another road by which the
men might escape. But it was partially submerged in freezing back-
water. Simon Bolivar Buckner, third in command, opposed attempt
to retreat by this road, claiming, as did the physicians, that three-
fourths of the men might be lost from wading waist-deep in icy water.
One remaining way of escape was by two small steamers that had ar-
rived that afternoon from Nashville. These boats could save a portion
of the Army. Floyd, fearing his former position as Secretary of War
under Buchanan would be his undoing if captured by Union troops,
decided to escape by the boats. Pillow was willing to surrender the gar-
rison, but not himself. So the two senior officers turned the command
over to Buckner. Floyd got some 1,500 of his Virginians away by the
steamers, while Pillow used a skiff to reach the opposite bank. The
hard-bitten Forrest, to whom surrender was anathema, took his five
hundred men off down the submerged road. Some infantrymen and
artillerymen who were willing to risk pneumonia and death from ex-
posure joined Forrest as he rode away into eventual fame.
After the escapees were gone, Buckner wrote his onetime fellow-
cadet Grant asking for terms. He expected moderate dealing, for they
had been friends at West Point, and eight years before, in New York,
when Grant was down and out, Buckner had given him the money to
go home. Grant's reply, however, was a curt "unconditional surrender,"
which became his noted nickname. Though Buckner regarded the
terms "as ungenerous and unchivalrous," when morning came, to avoid
sacrificing so many lives, he ran down the Stars and Bars. U. S. Grant
had now amended his tarnished record in the Army. He had won a
decisive victory, and was deservedly made a Major General.
The disastrous news of Donelson's fall shook the Confederacy. Jef-
ferson Davis was greatly dispirited. It was, so far, the South's worst
defeat. Some 12,000 Confederates were taken prisoner. Kentucky
seemed irretrievably lost. The way to Nashville was open for Union
troops. Two hostile armies were now converging on Sidney Johnston,
who had swiftly moved his remaining forces from Bowling Green to
Nashville.
Johnston knew his small army could never hold the city against
YOU REMEMBER THE MAN
both Grant and Buell. When the citizens learned they were to be aban-
doned, consternation and despair, grief and wrath seized them. Some
prepared to flee; some began to loot army supplies, which General
Floyd was loading on cars for removal. A witness wrote of "the wild
terror and agony of a population which believed that it was about to
suffer every extremity of brutality and violence." The people of Ten-
nessee and the Southwest realized for the first time the grim and deadly
nature of the struggle.
In Richmond President Davis received frantic telegrams from per-
sons of importance and people of no importance, calling on him for
help. A former member of the United States Congress, in whose very-
house Johnston was making his temporary headquarters, telegraphed:
Nothing but your presence here can save Tennessee. General Johnston's
army is demoralized. Your presence will reassure it, and will save Tennessee.
Nothing else can. For God's sake, come!
In his prepared inaugural address, to be delivered a few days hence,
President Davis had to make changes. To follow the proud line "We
have maintained the war by our unaided exertions, 37 he was now con-
strained to write: "After a series of successes and victories, we have
recently met with serious disasters."
At the calamitous turn of events and the howls of criticism against
Sidney Johnston and the Administration, Davis, to relieve his packed
heart, began a letter to his intimate friend and factor, J. U. Payne of
New Orleans. Payne was one of the very few persons to whom he could
ever bare personal griefs.
My dear Jacob
Dearest friend, I wish you to console me in a most trying hour. I have
the most vexing problems surmounting the most vicious you and I ever
twinly put down. I forbear to tell you of my utmost, my desire to see the
South win, but in every standpoint . . .
Davis wrote on for ten more lines, but did not finish the letter, and
the fragment was never mailed. 2 Perhaps he felt he was goi 
