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SEWARD 7 ^ (ji5
AND ^
THE DECLARATION OF PARIS
A Forgotten Diplomatic Episode ' . ^ ^^j
APRIL-AUGUST, 1861
BY
CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS
BOSTON
I 912
[The following paper, prepared for the Massachusetts Historical
Society, and submitted at its October Meeting, 191 2, appears in the
printed Proceedings of that Society, vol. xlvi. pp. 23-81.]
SEWARD AND THE DECLARATION
OF PARIS.
The period between April 13, 1861, when Fort Sumter fell,
and July 21, following, which witnessed the Bull Run catas-
trophe — a period of exactly one hundred days — constituted
the first distinctive stage of our Civil War. Formative, during
it the loyal portion of the Union was, so to speak, finding it-
self. In an excited and altogether abnormal condition moraUy,
it was imreasoning, unreasonable and curiously illogical. As an
interval of time, therefore, the period referred to stands by
itself, to be treated separately from that which preceded or that
which was to follow. Before April 13th and up to that day —
strange as the assertion now sounds — the historic fact is that
the coimtry, taken as a whole, had no realizing sense of the im-
pending. Though anxiety was great and continually increasing, it
was stiU generally believed that, somehow or in some way, provi-
dential if not otherwise, an actual appeal to arms and a conse-
quent internecine struggle would not take place. Too dreadful
calmly to contemplate, it could not, and consequently would not,
occur.^ The firing on Fort Smnter dispelled this illusion, and an
entire community at last realized the grim, hard facts of a
situation truly appalling. Then, so far as the part of the coun-
try loyal to the Union was concerned, there ensued the hundred
days referred to, — days of artificial excitement and self-
•delusion. Fired by patriotism and literally drunk with enthu-
siasm, the North indulged in a most exaggerated self-confidence,
combined with an altogether undue depreciation of its opponent.
* "Neither party appeared to be apprehensive of or to realize the gathering
storm. There was a general belief, indulged in by most persons, that an adjust-
ment would in some way be brought about, without any extensive resort to ex-
treme measures. . . . Until blood was spilled there was hope of conciliation."
Welles, Diary, 1. 10, 12, 35, 172, 355-356.
The conflict was to be short, sharp and decisive. A military
walk-over was confidently anticipated; the so-called Confed-
eracy was to be obliterated by one wild rush. The cry of "On
to Richmond," first raised by Horace Greeley in the New York
Tribune, soon became general and irresistible. But the delu-
sion was not confined to the unthinking or less weU-informed.
Shared to an almost equal extent by those in official position, it
was reflected in their attitude and stands recorded in their
utterances. This was peculiarly apparent in the management
of our foreign relations through the State Department, of which
Mr. Seward was the head. The awakening — and it was a
terribly rude one — came on the 21st of July, at Bull Run;
and from that day the struggle entered on a wholly new phase.
The community, at first panic-stricken, then soon sobered. The
strength and fighting capacity of the Confederacy had been
immistakably demonstrated; and, the first artificial flush of
enthusiasm dispelled, the coimtry addressed itself in a wholly
new spirit to the supreme effort to which it at last realized it
was simMnoned. The magnitude and consequent uncertainty
of the struggle were realized.
In the course of a somewhat elaborate historical study my
attention has recently been drawn to an altogether forgotten
diplomatic episode which occurred in that stage of initial
crystallization, and to it I propose to devote this paper. As
an incident in a most critical period, what I have to describe
will, I think, prove not without interest; and, at the time, it
was, as I now view it, of a possible importance appreciated
neither then nor since.
I recently received a letter from our associate, Mr. Frederic
Bancroft, author of the Life of Seward, in which, referring
to an allusion of mine, he said: "Unless you have taken stand
directly against your father and your brother Henry's essay
in regard to Seward's and your father's attitude toward the^
attempted accession of the United States, in 186 1, to the dec-
laration of Paris of 1856, 1 very much wish to argue the point
with you, orally, of course."
The allusion recalled the fact, which I had quite forgotten,
that Mr. Henry Adams had prepared such a paper as Mr. Ban-
croft referred to,^ and, moreover, that I had myself nearly
* Historical Essays , 237-289.
twenty years ago made large use of it in writing chapter xn
entitled "The Treaty of Paris," in the Life ofC. P. Adams, in
the American Statesman Series. Mr. Bancroft had subsequently
gone over the same grouind, but I could not recall the conclu-
sions he had reached. In fact, the whole subject had passed
completely out of my memory. I accordingly once more reverted
to it, carefully re-reading Mr. Henry Adams's paper, the chap-
ter (xxxi) relating to the episode in Mr. Bancroft's Seward,
and finally my own effort of a score of. years since. The
general historians had not apparently deemed the incident
worthy even of passing notice. In this, as will presently be
seen, I do not concur.
As usual, the more thoroughly I now studied the records,
the more important, involved, and suggestive the episode be-
came. Above all, I was amazed and mortified at the superfi-
cial character of my own previous treatment; for I now found
myself compelled to most imwelcome conclusions, not only
different from those I had previously set forth, but altogether
at variance with those reached by Mr. Henry Adams in his
carefully prepared study. Though peculiarly well-informed as
to the facts, having himself been practically at the time con-
cerned in what occurred, I now foimd reason to conclude he
had written from the point of view of an active and interested
participant; and siace he published his paper fresh material
had come to light. I so wrote at much length to Mr. Bancroft,
with whose subsequently prepared narrative and conclusions I
now find myself in more general, though not in complete,
accord. That letter to Mr. Bancroft supplies the basis of what
I here submit. In submitting it, however, I wish to premise
that in it no regard has been paid to the literary aspect, nor
can it even be considered a finished historical study. Rather
in the nature of a compendium or syllabus, into it I have
put a mass of somewhat heterogeneous matter with a view
to making the same more accessible in future to myself, as
well as other investigators of a highly interesting historical
period. I regard the result, therefore, largely as raw material,
in the accumulation and presenting of which I have to ac-
knowledge much and efficient assistance received from our
Editor.
For an intelligent comprehension of what is to follow in its
far-reaching significance and somewhat dramatic interest,,
it is, however, necessary to go pretty far back, — so to speak,
to begin at the beginning. Attention has already been called
to the date of the bombardment and fall of Fort Smnter, —
April 13, 1861. Events then followed rapidly. Sumter was
surrendered on Satiurday, and the papers of the following
Monday the isth, contained the proclamation of the Presi-
dent calling for troops, and summoning Congress to meet July
4th in extra session.^ Two days later, the 17th, Jefferson Davis
responded from Montgomery by declaring the intention of the
Confederacy immediately to issue letters of marque, authorizing
depredations by privateers on the ships and commerce of the
loyal States.^ On the 19th, the Friday of the week following the
fall of Simiter, President Lincoln issued yet another proclama-
tion announcing a blockade of the ports of all the seceding States.
In this proclamation it was stated that the blockade was to be
conducted " in pursuance of the laws of the United States and
of the law of nations in such case provided " ; and, fimaUy, to
meet the threatened retaliation through privateers and pri-
vateering, it was added "that if any person under the pretended
authority of such [Confederate] States • • . shall molest a ves-
sel of the United States, or the persons or cargo on board of her,
such person will be held amenable to the laws of the United
States for the prevention and pimishment of piracy.*' ' Two
international issues were thus presented and brought to the front
within the first week following the fall of Smnter. .They were
the issues of belligerency in case of a blockade of the first mag-
nitude, proclaimed to be enforced "in pursuance of the law of
nations," and the logically consequent issue naturally involved
in what is known as privateering. Five days later, on April
24th, a circular addressed to the representatives of the United
States in all the principal capitals, was issued from the State
Department calling attention to the attitude now proposed to
be assumed by the United States towards what was known as
the Declaration of Paris.
This so-called Declaration was an outcome of the Crimean
War. When, in the summer of 1853, that war broke out, nearly
* Messages and Papers of the Presidents^ vi. 13.
* Messages and Papers of the Confederacy^ i. 60.
* Messages and Papers of the Presidents, vi. 14.
forty years had elapsed since the close of the Napoleonic period:
a period during which, as is well known, a system of semi-bar-
barous rules of so-called international law had been ruthlessly
enforced by all belligerents. In 1853 those rules were still
recognized as obUgatory and enforceable, though m abeyance.
As an historical fact, it was imdeniable that, on the high seas,
piracy was the natural condition of man; and, when the arti-
ficial state of peace ceased, into that condition as between those
involved in the strife nations relapsed. To ameliorate this state
of affairs, both possible and imminent, and to readjust in some
degree the rules of international law to meet changed commer-
cial conditions, Great Britain and France, on the outbreak of
the war with Russia, agreed to respect neutral commerce,
whether under their own flags or that of Russia; and, at the
close of the war, the Congress of Paris adopted, in April, 1856, a
Declaration embracing four heads:
1. Privateering is and remains abolished.
2. The neutral flag covers enemy's goods, with the ex-
ception of contraband of war.
3. Neutral goods, with the exception of contraband of
war, are not liable to capture under enemy's flag.
4. Blockades in order to be binding must be effective;
that is to say, maintained by forces sufficient really to pre-
vent access to the coast of the enemy.
Great Britain, France, Prussia, Russia, Austria and Turkey
adopted this mutual agreement, and pledged themselves to
make it known to States not represented in the Congress, and
invite their accession to it, on two conditions: (i) That
the Declaration should be accepted as a whole, or not at
all; and (2) That the States acceding should enter into no
subsequent arrangement on maritime law in time of war
without stipulating for a strict observance of the four points.
On these conditions every maritime power was to be invited
to accede, and had the right to become a party to the agree-
ment. Accordingly nearly all the nations of Europe and
South America in course of time notified their accession,
and became, equally with the original parties contracting, en-
titled to all the benefits and subject to the obligations of the
compact.
Among the rest, the government of the United States was
8
invited to accede, and, like the other powers, had the right
so to do by simple notification. This was during the Pierce
administration; and Mr. Marcy, then Secretary of State, in
due time (July 28, 1856) informed the governments interested
that the President could not abandon the right to have recourse
to privateers, unless he could secure the exemption of all pri-
vate property, not contraband, from capture at sea; ^ with
that amendment the United States would become a party to
the Declaration.
In other words, in addition to the points agreed on at Paris
the United States contended for the establishment of the same
principle on the sea that obtained on land, to wit: the exemp-
tion from capture or unnecessary molestation of all private
property, not contraband of war, including ships. The last
great vestige of the earlier times of normal piracy was, by gen-
eral consent, to be relegated to the past. With the exception
of Great Britain, the more considerable European maritime
powers made no objection to the Marcy amendment. For
obvious reasons connected with her past history and naval
preponderance. Great Britain was understood to oppose it.
President Buchanan's was essentially an "Ostend mani-
festo," or filibuster, administration. As such, it felt no call
to the proposed modifications; ^ but when Lincoln succeeded
* [This policy goes back to 1823, when President Monroe recommended it in
his message of 1823. " I trust you will not take, as I am told some legislative
statesmen have done, the proposition mentioned in the message for abolishing
private war upon the sea to be a mere offer to abolish privateering. You will
understand it as it is meant, a project for the universal exemption of private
property upon the ocean from depredation by war." John Quincy Adams to
Robert Walshy December 3, 1823. Ed.]
* [The following has an historical interest in this connection. September 5,
1861, Richard Cobden wrote to James Buchanan saying: ''The subject of the
blockade is becoming more and more serious. I am afraid we have ourselves to
blame for not having placed the question of belligerent rights on a better footing."
He then asked a question about the attitude of the United States towards the
Declaration of Paris. Buchanan replied, December 14, 1861: "In reference to
yoiir question in regard to blockade, no administration within the last half-cen-
tury, up to the end of my term, would have consented to a general declaration
abolishing privateering. Our most effectual means of annoying a great naval
power upon the ocean is by granting letters of marque and reprisal. We could not
possibly, therefore, have consented to the Paris declaration which would have left
the vessels (for example of Great Britain or France) free to capture our merchant
vessels, whilst we should have deprived ourselves of the employment of the force
which had proved so powerful in capturing their merchant vesseb. Hence the
proposition of Mr. Marcy to abolish war upon private property altogether on
Buchanan the aspect of the proposition had, from the United
States point of view, undergone dramatic change. Threatened
with Confederate letters of marque, the government also found
itself engaged in, and responsible for, a blockade of the first
magnitude. Under such circumstances, it was plainly impossible
to forecast all contingencies, and it was very open to question
what poUcy might in certain exigencies prove the more ex-
pedient; but, on the whole, it seemed to the administration
wisest to endeavor to condliate Europe.
The question immediately arises, What was intended by the
word "privateering" as used in the Declaration? On that
would seem, in the present case, to have depended the attitude
of the Diplomat at the time and the conclusions of the His-
torian since; for on this point strange confusion runs through all
the correspondence, memoirs and records. Nor is this con-
fusion peculiar to pur Civil War state papers and literature.
It is, on the contrary, very noticeable in the writings con-
nected with our anterior wars, both that of Independence and
that of 1812-1815. In the earlier cases it clearly existed in the
minds of those engaged in the discussion. In the case, how-
ever, of the Civil War, the confusion was apparently due in
quite as great a degree to a desire to ignore and confound
manifest and well-recognized distinctions as to any real lack
of a correct understanding of terms.
Up to the middle of the last (nineteenth) century, there were
various recognized forms of ocean depredation.^ Enumer-
ating these in order, they were carried on
1. By pirates, so called, through what was known as "pi-
racy." A familiar term, this calls for no definition.
2. By what were known as "corsairs."
3. By privateers, sailing in time of war under letters of
marque issued by a belligerent.
4. By regularly commissioned ships of war, belonging to a
recognized belligerent, under whose flag they sailed.
the ocean, as modem civilization had abolished it on the land." Works of James
Buchanan (Moore), xi. 218, 234. Ed.]
* Throughout the preparation of this paper constant use has been made of
Prof. J. Bassett Moore's invaluable Digest of International Law (1906), and es-
pecially of the collection of authorities and material under the two heads of
Privateers and the Declaration of Paris, vn. 535-583, sees. 1215-1221. Only
in exceptional cases, therefore, is special reference made to this compendiimi.
lO
There has more recently come into existence a class of vessels
known as "commerce destroyers," constructed not for combat
primarily, but for the purpose of inflicting injury on the com-
merdal marine of a hostile power with whidi tiie beUigerent
owning the "conmierce destroyer" is at war. The term, how-
ever, refers only to a type of naval construction. It in no way
affects legal classification. The "commerce destroyer" is
simply a public cruiser adapted to a specific purpose.
On these distinctions the whole issue depends. In the minds,
however, of those who carried on the negotiation of 1861, the
distinctions do not seem to have been dear; and the failure
then to observe, or the endeavor to ignore and obscure them,
complicated the whole diplomatic situation, and at more than
one jimcture gravely threatened our foreign relations.
The ownership of the vessel sailing under a letter of marque
was, then, of the very essence of privateering. This, in 1861,
established the distinguishing line; and so lay at the basis of
Article I of the Declaration. The privateer thus held, so to
speak, a betwixt-and-between position; a privately owned
maritime adventure, its letter of marque, issued by a belliger-
ent, gave it a legal status. But for that it would have been
subject to treatment as a pirate. The distinction is, too, espe-
cially important to be borne in mind while discussing the prob-
lems which developed from the maritime operations conducted
during the Civil War, inasmuch as the value of the privateer,
and the inducement to "privateering," then depended on suc-
cess in the capture of prizes; which prizes, when duly con-
demned, were to be the plunder, or property, of the individual
owner of the privateer. They did not, nor do they belong
to the Government that issued the letters of marque imder
which the privateer sails. An individual venture, tiose con-
cerned in the privateer were to a degree irresponsible. The
point was very elaborately discussed later in the War, by
Secretary Welles, in a series of letters addressed to Secretary
Seward, when it was proposed to issue letters of marque to
Union adventurers supposed to be anxious to chase the Con-
federate cruisers.*
The preservation of the prize, with a view to its condemna-
tion as such, is, therefore, the great and essential inducement
^ Welles, Lincoln and Seward, 145-173; Diary, i. 346-262.
II
to privateering. From mere commerce destruction the priva-
teer gets no advantage. This it was, combined with the absence
of any open port where condemnation proceedings were pos-
sible, which ahnost at once put an end to the whole scheme of
Confederate privateering. The obvious fact that it must so do
was pointed out and emphasized by the first Confederate Com-
missioners — Yancey, Rost and Mann — as early as August
14, 1861, in their elaborate commimication to Earl Russell of
that date. That Great Britain and France had closed their
ports to prizes of Confederate privateers sailing under letters
of marque, was in the following terms then made subject of
grave remark and implied remonstrance:
The undersigned, however, received with some surprise and re-
gret, the avowal of Her Britannic Majesty's Qpvemment that in
order to the observance of a strict neutrality, the public and private
armed vessels of neither of the contending parties would be permitted
to enter Her Majesty's ports with prizes. The undersigned do not
contest the right of the British Government to make such regula-
tions, but have been disposed to thiak that it has been unusual for
Her Majesty's Grovemment to exercise such right, and that in this
instance the practical operation of the rule has been to favor the
Government at Washington, and to cripple the exercise of an un-
doubted public right of the Government of the Confederate States.
This Government commenced its career entirely without a navy.
Owing to the high sense of duty which distinguished the Southern
Officers, who were lately in commission in the United States Navy,
the ships which, otherwise, might have been brought into Southern
ports, were honorably delivered up to the United States Government,
and the Navy, built for the protection of the people of all the States,
is now used by the Government at Washington to coerce the people
and blockade the ports of one-third of the States of the late Union.
The people of the Confederate States are an agricultural and not a
manufacturing or commercial people. They own but few ships.
Hence there has not been the least necessity for the Government at
Washington to issue letters of marque. TTie people of the Confed-
erate States have but few ships and not much commerce upon which
such private armed vessels could operate. The commodities pro-
duced in the Confederate States are such as the world needs more
than any other, and the nations of the Earth have heretofore sent
their ships to our wharves, and there the merchants buy and receive
our cotton and tobacco. But it is far otherwise with the people of
12
the present United States. They are a manufacturing and conamer-
dal people. They do a large part of the carrying trade of the world.
Their ships and commerce afford them the sinews of war, and keep
their industry afloat. To cripple their industry and commerce; to
destroy their ships or cause them to be dismantled and tied up to
their rotting wharves, are legitimate objects and means of warfare.
Having no navy, no commercial marine, out of which to improvise
public armed vessels to any considerable extent, the Confederate
States were compelled to resort to the issuance of letters of marque,
a mode of warfare as fully and as clearly recognized by the law and
usage of nations, as any other arm of war; and most assuredly more
humane and more civilized in its practice than that which appears
to have distinguished the march of the troops of the Gk)vemment
of the United States upon the soil and among the villages of Vir-
ginia. These facts tend to show that the practical working of the
rule that forbids the entry of the public and private armed vessels
of either party into British ports with prizes, operates exclusively to
prevent the exercise of this legitimate mode of warfare by the Con-
federate States, while it is to a great degree a practical protection
to the commerce and ships of the United States.
So much for privateers and privateering. A pirate, on the
other hand, is a common enemy of mankind. He sails under
no flag, and is responsible to no Government. A robber on the
high seas, he is simply an outlaw.^
The public announcement, immediately after the firing on
Simater, that the Confederacy proposed to issue letters of
marque naturally caused great alarm to the Union authorities,
and the ship-owners of the loyal States. Under the conditions
prevailing in April, May and Jime, 1861, it well might. W. H.
Russell in his Diary gives a lively and picturesque account of
the state of Reeling then existing at Montgomery and of the
1 Almost every known term of opprobrium can be found in the Civil War
literature, official and private, applied to vessels sailing under the flag of the
Confederacy. They are thus not infrequently designated "corsairs." This
again was a misuse of terms; for, while a " corsair " is, strictly speaking,
a " pirate," the word in general acceptance signifies a description of piratical
craft long since passed out of existence. The corsair is especially associated with
the Barbary Powers, so called, and preyed upon foreign commerce not protected
by those powers; but vessels known as corsairs were, as a rule, commissioned
by the Barbary States, and sailed under their flags. They in a way constituted
a navy. The corsair passed out of existence about 1816 with the decay in power
of the Barbary States. The pirate was simply exterminated, like other out-
laws, robbers and free-booters.
13
views, knowledge and intentions of the Confederate authori-
ties as respects letters of marque. What he then wrote did not
at the time appear in his letters published in the Times; and
that for obvious reasons. A neutral and a newspaper corre-
spondent, he was imder a well-imderstood obligation to disclose
nothing, not already public, which would give information or
contribute aid to the other party to the conflict. So in the
London Times of May 30th, what is now about to be quoted
from the Diary, published eighteen months later, appeared
only in the following compressed and extremely non-committal
form: "On leaving the Secretary I proceeded to the room of the
Attorney-General, Mr. Benjamin, a very intelligent and able
man, whom I f oimd busied in preparations connected with the
issue of letters of marque. Everything in the office looked like
earnest work and business.''
Dates are here important as bearing on the conditions then
prevailing, and the consequent state of mind and feeling of
those upon whom rested the responsibility for action. The
brief extract just quoted appeared, it will be noticed, in the
issue of the London Timss of May 30th. On the 6th and 9th of
the same month Russell was making in his Diary the following
mor^ detailed record:
Mr. Benjamin [then acting as Attorney-General of the Confed-
eracy] is the most open, frank, and cordial of the Confederates
whom I have yet met. In a few seconds he was telling me all about
the course of Government with respect to privateers and letters of
marque and reprisal, in order probably to ascertain what were our
views in England on the subject. I observed it was likely the North
would not respect their flag, and would treat their privateers as
pirates. "We have an easy remedy for that. For any man under
our flag whom the authorities of the Uiiited States dare to execute,
we shall hang two of their people." "Suppose, Mr. Attorney-
General, England, or any of the great powers which decreed the
abolition of privateering, refuses to recognize your flag?" "We iq-
tend to claim, and do claim, the exercise of all the rights and privi-
leges of an independent sovereign State, and any attempt to refuse
us the full measure of those rights would be an act of hostility to our
country." "But if England, for example, declared your privateers
were pirates?" "As the United States never admitted the principle
laid down at the Congress of Paris, neither have the Confederate
States. If England thinks fit to declare privateers imder our flag
14
pirates, it would be nothing more or less than a declaration of war
against us, and we must meet it as best we can.". • • As I was going
down stairs, Mr. Browne called me into his room. He said that
the Attorney-General and himself were in a state of perplexity as
to the form in which letters of marque and reprisal should be made out.
They had consulted all the books they could get, but foimd no ex-
amples to suit their case, and he wished to know, as I was a bar-
rister, whether I could aid him. I told him it was not so much my
regard to my own position as a neutral, as the vafri inscitia juris
which prevented me throwing any light on the subject. There are
not only Yankee ship-owners but English firms ready with sailors
and steamers for the Confederate Government, and the owner of
the Camilla might be tempted to part with his yacht by the offers
made to him. pVir. Browne had three days before assured Lord
Russell that] the Government had already received numerous —
I think he said four himdred — letters from ship-owners appl3dng
for letters of marque and reprisal. Many of these applications were
from merchants in Boston, and other maritime cities in the New Eng-
land States.^
»
ff In studying the history of what then occurred and the con-
siderations which influenced the policy and utterances of those
responsible, as were Davis and Seward, for the course of events,
the foregoing is distinctly illuminating. It throws a penetrat-
ing light on a condition of affairs now wholly matter of the past,
but one necessary to bear in mind if the course pursued by those
public characters is to be understood, much more if an historic
justice is to be meted out to them. The essential fact is, and
it is apparent from the foregoing extract, that in May, 1861,
Judah P. Benjamin on the one side, and W. H. Seward on the
other, took up a line of policy exactly where it had been dropped
on the conclusion of the treaty of Ghent, in December, 1814.
Confronted by a new and quite unforeseen situation, they in-
sensibly reverted to the state of affairs which had existed half
a century before, and the methods adopted in dealing with it.
They failed, and most naturally failed, to grasp the fact that
nearly every condition had changed; and, consequently, they
had to grope their way somewhat blindly and altogether tenta-
tively to a realizing sense of this fact. During the intervening
half-century steam had supplanted wind as the essential factor
in naval operations; and this fact, under the international con-
^ Russell, My Diary , North and South, chapters xxn-xxm.
15
ditions which prevailed throughout our Civil War, set at naught
all the hopes and anticipations of Mr. Benjamin, and, had he
from the first fully realized what it implied, would have justi-
fied Mr. Seward in dismissing his apprehensions, so far as injury
from privateers was concerned. In other words, what Benjamin
hoped for and Seward feared was the fitting out at individual
cost in Confederate and neutral ports of a swarm of cruisers who
would in view of the illicit profits to be derived therefroni prey
on American commerce, repeating the experience of the wars
anterior to 1815. It was this class of venture to which the first
article of the Declaration of Paris was meant to apply, — the
fitting out and maintenance on the sea of privately owned
cruisers sailing imder letters of marque. It in no way applied
to vessels, whether commerce destroyers or others, built,
equipped, armed and commissioned by a recognized belligerent.
As a matter of fact, therefore, and imder the international con-
ditions maintained throughout our Civil War, the provision
of the Declaration of Paris inhibiting privateering, had it been
in force, would have proved inoperative; and it would have
proved inoperative simply because, contrary to the hopes and
expectations of Mr. Benjamin on the one side, and the fears
and apprehensions of Mr. Seward on the other, privateering,
within the meaning of the Declaration of Paris, cut no figure.
Why it thus cut no figure is obvious. The British and
French proclamations of belligerency, and consequent neutrality,
of May 13 and Jime 10, 1861, solved the difficulty and, though
undesignedly, solved it imder the altogether novel maritime
conditions then existing in favor of the United States. Priva-
teers sailing imder letters of marque could then by the old and
established maritime usage be fitted out in either neutral or
Confederate ports, sailing therefrom. As matter of fact, how-
ever, both were practically closed. The last, the Confederate
ports, were closed by a blockade, made possible by steam, to
either the egress of armed vessels, whether public or private,
or the ingress of such vessels, or any prizes that might
be captured by them. So long, therefore, as the blockade
could be effectively maintained, or, in other words, so long as
the European naval powers did not actively intervene to put
an end to the ocean mastery of the Union, that source of danger
was sealed up. Practically, also, the neutral ports were equally
i6
dosed; for not only was the fitting out of privateers, as also of
commissioned cruisers, in disregard of neutrality, and so illegal,
but if an evasion of the law was successful or even connived at,
the bringing in of prizes was forbidden. The entire inducement
and incentive to privateering, in the sense of the Declaration
of Paris, was thus cut off. So far as privateering, therefore,
is concerned, whether with the ports of the Confederacy or
neutral ports as a basis, everything depended on the blockade,
and the observance as respects prizes of foreign neutrality;
and on that neutrality, and its continual observance, the block-
ade itself was dependent. Consequently, everything in the
struggle from the outset, privateering of course included,
hinged on what is known as Sea Dominion.
So far, however, as the present study is concerned, the one
important result thus far reached is that, apparently, the first
article of the Declaration of Paris had, under conditions then
prevailing, so little practical application to maritime opera-
tions during the Civil War as to constitute in them but a negligi-
ble quantity. The Confederate commissioners in the extract
just given from their commimication to the British Foreign
Secretary set forth the situation in terms of moderation when
they said that the Southern States were "neither a manufac-
turing nor a commercial pecple, . . . having no navy, no
commercial marine, out of which to improvise public armed
vessels to any considerable extent." Captain J. D. Bulloch,
the Confederate naval agent and representative in Europe
throughout the struggle, writing in 1883, stated the case far
more correctly. He said: "It was impossible to build armored
vessels in the Confederate States for operations on the coast;
— neither the materials* nor the mechanics were there; and be-
sides, even if iron and skilled artisans had been within reach,
there was not a mill in the country to roll the plates, nor furnaces
and machinery to forge them, nor shops to make the engines." ^
Under such conditions the most the Confederacy could accom-
plish within itself was to construct rude floating batteries,
propelled by most insufficient engines, and adapted to inland-
water operations both defensive and offensive, — vessels of the
type of the Virginia, at Norfolk, and the Tennessee, at Mobile,
in no way fit for ocean service. Nor were conditions more
^ Bulloch, Secret Service, i. 380.
17
favorable for the proper fitting out of a privateering fleet. Bul-
loch subsequently wrote: "It is quite safe for me to state that
at the beginning of the year r86i there was not, within the whole
boundary of the Confederacy, a single private yard having the
plant necessary to build and equip a cruising ship of the most
moderate offensive capacity." ^
Under such conditions, domestic and foreign. Confederate
privateering within the meaning of the Declaration of Paris
died an early and natural death.* As prizes could not, because
of the blockade, be sent into Confederate ports for purpose of
condenmation and sale, and as all foreign ports were closed to
them, the inducement ceased to exist. The record of Confed-
erate privateering proper can, therefore, be briefly recounted.
Early in May, 1861, at the outset of troubles, a rumor got
abroad that an iron steamer, the Peerless, equipped on the
Great Lakes, had been bought by the Confederate Govern-
ment, preparatory to being sent .to sea to operate on American
commerce. Secretary Seward was at this time, as we now
know, in an irritable state of mind, and one decidedly aggres-
sive. The course of domestic events was not going as he had
planned it should go ; his position in the Cabinet was anomalous ;
his leadership was challenged; his influence, as the natural re-
sult of frequent forecastings invariably proved mistaken in the
result, was plainly waning both in Washington and the country
at large. Temporarily, at any rate, his prestige was distinctly
impaired. Not imnaturally, also, his views at this stage of the
conflict as to the foreign policy best to be adopted imder circum-
stances altogether unprecedented were, to say the least, inchoate.
So he, head of the Department of State, now sent a telegraphic
order to aU naval officers of the United States to seize the Peer-
less "under any flag, and with any papers," if they had probable
information that she had been sold to agents of the Confederacy.
In consequence of a vigorous protest against such a high-handed
measure immediately filed by the British Minister, the Secretary,
however, the same day wrote to Lord Lyons that if the informa-
tion on which action was taken "proved to be incorrect, full
satisfaction will be promptly given." ^ And even in this formal
1 Bulloch, Secret Service, i. 23.
* Seward to Adams, May 38, 1862. Diplomatic Correspondence, 1862, loi.
• Parliamentary Paper, North America, No. i, 1862, 31-33.
i8
paper the usual confusion of thought and expression was per-
ceptible, for it was stated that the ship in question was rumored
to have been sold to the de facto insurgent government "to be
used as a privateer." There was a distinctly humorous ele-
ment in the outcome of this initial episode, illustrative of the
way in which important public business was then transacted.
Lord Lyons in due time reported to Earl Russell, "It turned
out that the ship had all the time been purchased by the
United States government itself," and this purchase had been
"the cause of proceedings of the vessel which were looked
upon as suspicious." ^
So far as my investigations enable me to form an opinion,
there is thus no case of a vessel actually going out from any
foreign port equipped as a privateer to sail under Confederate
letters of marque. In every instance the vessel so equipped and
going to sea was the property of the Confederacy, commissioned
as such, and intended to perform the part of a modem commerce
destroyer.
The only privateers, properly so classified, which, sailing
under letters of marque, appeared upon the ocean and com-
mitted ravages on American commerce, were vessels equipped
very early in the war in Confederate ports, and sent to sea
therefrom. This phase of the struggle has been exhaustively
and satisfactorily treated by J. T. Scharf in his History of the
Confederate Navy? The author, also, therein draws the dis-
tinction already referred to:
A privateer, as the name imports, is a private armed ship, fitted
out at the owner's expense, but commissioned by a belligerent gov-
ernment to capture the ships and goods of the enemy at sea, or the
ships of neutrals when convejdng to the enemy goods contraband of
* Lyons to Russell j Ib.j 115. This was not the only or most important instance
in which, during the early weeks of the Lincohi administration, the fimctions of
the Navy Department were without consultation assumed by the Department of
State. In the Welles Diary (i. 23-25) there is an interesting account of a similar
proceeding, leading at a most critical jimcture to consequences of far greater
moment. Secretary Welles, probably with undue severity, subsequently wrote
{Diary, i. 204) of Mr. Seward: "He gets behind me, tampers with my subordi-
nates, and interferes injuriously and ignorantly in naval matters, not so much
from wrong purposes, but as a busybody by nature. I have not made these
matters subjects of complaint outside and thiiok it partly the result of usage and
practice at Albany." See, also, 76., n. 160.
■ Chapter iv, 53-93. Second edition. 1894.
19
war. A privateer differs from a pirate in this, that the one has a
commission and the other has none. A privateer is entitled to the
same rights of war as the public vessels of the belligerent. A pirate
ship has no rights, and her crew are liable to be captured and put
to death by all nations, as robbers and murderers on the high seas, j
In examining the list in this book given of vessels fitted out
and sailing from Confederate ports imder letters of marque
during the first simamer of the War, it is curious to observe how
closely the traditions of 1812-1815 were followed. The vessels
were in greatest part mere schooners, hastily equipped and
insuflGlciently armed. Fifty years behind the times, and rely-
ing solely on canvas, they were at the mercy of ships pro-
pelled by steam. The following is, for instance, an individual
experience:
The revenue cutter Aiken, which had been seized in Charleston
by the authorities of South Carolina before the firing on Fort Sxmiter,
was fitted out as a privateer, and called the Fetrd, and placed under
the command of Capt. Wm. Perry. On July 27th the privateer
schooner sailed out of Charleston, and stood for the U. S. frigate
SL Lawrence, which she mistook for a merchantman, as all her ports
were closed. When the Petrel got within range she fired three shots
without doing any damage. The St. Lawrence returned with shot
and shell a terrific fire, one shell exploding in the hull of the Petrel,
and sinking her instantly. The boats of the frigate were lowered, and
picked up thirty-six out of forty of the privateer's crew, who were
taken aboard, and their feet and hands heavily manacled. The
remaining four were drowned.^
During the first months of the war, and before the blockade
became really effective, quite a nimaber of these privateers got
to sea, and some of their captures — sent into Confederate
ports — were there duly condemned and sold. Others were
released after being bonded; but the greatest number of ves-
sels captured were scuttled and otherwise destroyed. The
injury thus sustained by the United States merchant marine
was undoubtedly considerable, but in largest part due to the
alarm occasioned, and the immediate consequent transfer of
American shipping to foreign ownership. As the war progressed
and the blockade became more effective, conditions produced
* Scharf, 86.
20
their natural results. Privateering was abandoned as both
perilous and unprofitable, and the maritime activity and spirit
of adventure of the Confederacy turned in the direction of
blockade nmning as at once less dangerous and far more remim-
erative. Privateering within the scope of Article I of the
Treaty of Paris may, therefore, be said to have ceased to be a
factor in the operations of the Civil War by the close of i86i.^
Premising these distinctions, principles and facts, it is now
proper to return to the narrative and the sequence of events.
The British proclamation of belligerency, as it is called, or
more properly the proclamation of neutrality in the conflict
which had developed, with the recognition of a belligerent
character in both parties thereto, was made public in London
during the week (May 15, 1861) following Mr. Russell's visit
at the office of Attorney-General Benjamin, at Montgomery;
and Secretary Seward was simultaneously formulating a poKcy,
the circular in relation to the accession of the United States to
the Declaration of Paris having been sent out on the 24th of
April, or some three weeks before.
In the interim had occurred the tumultuous popular uprising
of the loyal States consequent upon the attack on Simiter. The
stage of incertitude and resulting panic hadi passed away,
troops, such as they were, were pouring into Washington, and
the country was well entered on the intermediate, over-confident
and self-inflated stage of the conflict referred to in the earlier
portion of this paper. Secretary Seward shared to the full in
1 "In the Civil War . . . the rebel government offered its letters of marque;
but, as nearly all the maritime powers had warned their subjects that if they
served in privateers in the war, their governments would not interfere to protect
them, and as the United States had threatened to treat such persons as pirates,
and the naval power of the United States was formidable^ no avowedly foreign
private armed vessels took letters of marque; and the ostensibly Confeder-
ate vessels were conmiissioned as of its regular navy." Dana, Wheaton, 456«.
" One popular error pervades all which has been said or written, on both sides of
the line, about the Confederate navy. . This is the general title of 'privateer'
given to all vessels not cooped up in southern harbors. . . . There was a law
passed, regulating the issue of letters of marque; and from time to time much
was heard of these in the South. But [with the exception of the] * Jeff Davis*
not more than two or three ever foimd their way to sea, and even these accom-
plished nothing. At one time, a company with heavy capital was gotten up in
Richmond, for the promotion of such enterprises; but it was looked upon as a
job and was little successful in any sense." De Leon, Four Years in Rebd
Capitals, 262.
21
these feelings, and that he did so was manifest both in his
utterances and his official despatches. Acting, it would appear,
under the impulse of the moment, and without sufficiently in-
forming himself as to the character of the action taken by the
British Government, or the consequences to be apprehended
therefrom, Mr. Seward not only now assumed high ground, but
the groimd by him taken could by no possibility be maintained
imless the most sanguine anticipations of the Union authorities
were fulfilled in the immediate future, those anticipations in no
way making provision for an unexpected adverse catastrophe.
Accordingly, the Secretary (May 17 th) set to work drafting
what he while engaged upon it described in a familiar letter to
a member of his family as a "bold remonstrance before it is too
late." ^ His remonstrance took the form of the despatch No. 10
of May 2 1 St, addressed to Mr. Adams.^ It is imnecessary for
present purposes to refer to it in detail. It is sufficient to say
that upon its receipt and first perusal Mr. Adams wrote in his
Diary: "The Government seems almost ready to declare war
with all the powers of Europe, and almost instructs me to with-
draw from communication with the ministers here m a certain
contingency. ... I scarcely know how to understand Mr.
Seward. The rest of the Government may be demented for all
I know; but he purely is cahn and wise. My duty here is in
so far as I can do it honestly to prevent the irritation from
coming to a downright quarrel. It seems to me like throwing
the game into the hands of the enemy." ' In the despatch re-
ferred to the Secretary, in addition to the suppression of domes-
1 Seward at Washingtony n. 575-576.
* The general tenor of this despatch was known at the time to Lord Lyons.
He wrote concerning it to Lord John Russell, under date of May 23d, as follows:
"Upon receiving the intelligence of your Lordship's declaration in Parliament,
Mr. Seward drew up a despatch to Mr. Adams to be communicated to your Lord-
ship in terms still stronger than any he had before used. I fear that the President
has consented to its being sent, on condition, however, that it is to be left to Mr.
Adams's discretion to communicate it or not, as he may think advisable. If
sent, it will probably reach London about the same time with this despatch."
(Parliamenkuy Paper, 1862, 39.) This despatch reached the Foreign Office
Jime 4th; the despatch referred to in it did not reach the Legation in London
until six days later, Jime loth. See also ParliamefUary Paper (1862), 115, where,
just at the crisis of the Trent affair (December 25, 186 1), the attention of Earl
Russell is called by Lord Lyons to Mr. Seward's despatch of May 21, then just
made public in the printed diplomatic correspondence accompanying the message
of the President.
* Ms. Diary, Monday, June 10, i86z.
22
tic insurrection, contemplated as possible if not immediately
impending, a war "between the United States and one, two, or
even more European nations," — a conflict of which he now
wrote to his wife, "it will be dreadful, but the end will be sure
and swift." The despatch was, in fact, a general defiance thrown
forth to governments throughout the world, whether avowedly
unfriendly or assumed to be so ! ^
In this despatch as originally drawn and submitted to the
President, the Secretary, reflecting the mood and expectations
of the hour, among much else observed that "after long for-
bearance, designed to soothe discontent and avert the need
of dvil war, the land and naval forces of the United States
have been put in motion to repress the insurrection. The
true character of the pretended new State is at once revealed.
It is seen to be a Power existing in pronimciamento only." ^
In preparing this puzzling,| if not. now well-nigh incompre-
hensible state paper, couched in language plainly calculated to
^ During the earlier portions of the Lincohi administration, largely through the
influence of the Secretary of State, no regular Cabinet meetings were held. Mr.
Welles asserts in his Diary (i. 138) that "Many of the important measxires, par-
ticularly of his own Department, [Mr. Seward] managed to dispose of or contrived
to have determined independent of the Cabinet." See also /&., i. 134, 154, 203,
274. So far as an3rwhere appears, this course was followed with respect to the
despatch of May 21. It was never submitted to the Cabinet, and, while rumors
of its purport were current, knowledge of its details seems at the time to have
been confined to the Secretary, Mr. Lincoln, and Mr. Sumner, Chairman of the
Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, who was consulted by the President in
regard to it. No reference to what then occurred is foimd in Pierce's Life of
Sumner. A year later, however, when a concerted move was made by the Re-
publican Senators to bring about the dismissal of Secretary Seward from the
Cabinet, much emphasis was laid upon this despatch, portions of which had been
published in the DiplotnaUc Correspondence of the previous year. In his Diary
Secretary Welles says that during the discussion which took place, December 20,
1862, between the committee of nine Senators and the President and members
of his Cabinet, the volume of Diplomatic Correspondence was alluded to; "some
letters denoimced as tmwise and impolitic were specified, one of which, a con-
fidential despatch to Mr. Adams, was read. If it was imwise to write, it was
certainly injudicious and indiscreet to publish such a doounent." (Diary, i.
igS; Lincoln and Seward, 76.) The Secretary of State was at this time very
generally accused of transmitting despatches of importance to the foreign rep-
resentatives without previously submitting them to the President. A case in
point was developed at this conference, Mr. Lincoln expressing great surprise
when his attention was called by Senator Smnner to a certain despatch in the
printed Diplomatic Correspondence (that to Mr. Adams, July 5, 1862), disclaiming
any knowledge of it. Pierce, iv. in.
' Nicolay and Hay, Lincoln, iv. 273.
23
provoke and precipitate a foreign^ crisis, one thing only is
obvious, — the Secretary of State was, in plain English, dis-
counting a wholly successful outcome of the movements of the
land and naval forces of the United States then preparing to be
put in immediate "motion to repress the insurrection." So
much is manifest. What, however, was [implied by the obser-
vation in the paragraph immediately succeeding that from
which the extract just given is quoted, is less apparent. The
Secretary went on to assert that in certain contingencies then
regarded as of more than probable occurrence "the laws of
nations afford an adequate and proper remedy, and we shall
avail ourselves of it." Clearly a threat, what that threat sig-
nified is still matter of inference.
Though a lawyer by calling, and as such in a way eminent,
Mr. Seward did not possess what is known as a legal mind, much
less one of judicial cast. Long retired from active practice, he
had never given any particular attention to the problems and
collection of usages which make up the body of what is denomi-
nated International Law. He now also freely admitted to his
Cabinet colleagues that, though almost daily called upon to
deal with novel and intricate international issues, he never
opened the treatises, and "that he was too old to study." One
of his associates (Blair) did not hesitate to say that in his
opinion the Secretary of State knew "less of public law than
any man who ever held a seat in the Cabinet"; while another
(Welles) put on record his surprise to find hiil^ "so little ac-
quainted with the books," ^ and a third (Bates) pronounced him
"no lawyer and no statesman." ^ Sumner, whose own concep-
tions of international usage were distinctly nebulous, averred
that Seward knew nothing of it; and apparently without consult-
ing so famiKar an authority as Wheaton, the Secretary of State
^ Allowance must always be made in case of statements found in the Welles
Diary as respects Mr. Seward. Referring, however, to his lack of acquaintance
with the principles of international law, Mr. Welles wrote as follows, imder a date
as late as January 30, 1865 : " He told me last week that he had looked in no book
on international law or admiralty law since he entered on the duties of his present
office. His thoughts, he says, come to the same conclusions as the writers and
students. This he has said to me more than once. In administrating the govern-
ment he seems to have little idea of constitutional and legal restraints, but acts
as if the ruler was omnipotent. Hence he has involved himself in constant diffi-
culties." Diaryt n. 233.
• Welles, JWory, 1. 170, 233, 275, 285; n. 93.
24
depended for his conclusions on the chief clerk of the Depart-
ment and a few unofficial advisers of questionable authority.^
What, however, Mr. Seward now distinctly implied, was that,
should Great Britain give shelter from our pursuit and pimish-
ment to those whom [she declared "lawful belligerents," but
who being our citizens we adjudged to be "pirates," the law
of nations would justify the United States in pursuing such
miscreants into neutral harbors and there destroying them.
The proposition was certainly "bold," — not to say startling.^
* "[Seward] has, with all his bustle and activity, but little application; relies
on Hunter and his clerk, Smith, ... to sustain him and hunt up his author-
ities." Welles, Diary, i. 275. "Whiting, Solicitor of the War Department, has
gone to Europe. Is sent out by Seward, I suppose. . . . [William Whiting is]
such a man as Stanton would select and Seward use." 75., 381, 544; n. 85.
William Whiting then occupied the position of solicitor of the War Department.
Caleb Gushing, whose loyalty at this time was not above suspicion, also seems
to have been an unofficial adviser. lb., i. 275.
* This would seem to be the imavoidable inference to be drawn from the de-
spatches of Secretary Seward connected with events of subsequent occurrence.
On the night of October 6, 1864, the Confederate cruiser Florida was run down
by the United States cruiser WachuseU in the harbor of Bahia, Brazil, and sub-
sequently towed out to sea and carried to Hampton Roads, as prize. In this case
there was no controversy as to facts. The whole proceeding was high-handed, and
in manifest violation of recognized principles of international law. As such it led
to formal representations on behalf of Brazil to which Secretary Seward replied
under date of December 20, 1864. The correspondence can be found in the
"British Case" prepared for the Geneva Arbitration (75-78) and in Bulloch's
Secret Service of the Confederate States in Europe (i. 199-224). In his reply to the
reclamation of the Brazilian Minister Secretary Seward then wrote tiat the
Florida, "like the Alabama, was a pirate, belonging to no nation or lawful bellig-
erent, and therefore that the harbouring and supplying of these piratical ships
and their crews in Brazilian ports were wrongs and injuries for which Brazil
justly owes reparation to the United States." The Secretary further denied that
the "insurgents of this coimtry are a lawful naval belligerent; and, on the con-
trary, it maintains that the ascription of that character by the Government of
Brazil to insurgent citizens of the United States, who have hitherto been, and
who still are, destitute of naval forces, ports, and courts, is an act of intervention
in derogation of the law of nations, and unfriendly and wrongfid, as it is mani-
festly injurious, to the United States."
In the preceding 3rear, in a despatch from Mr. Seward to Mr. Adams (DipUh
matic Correspondence, 1863, Part I. 309-310) relating to the recent decision in
the case of the Alexandra, Mr. Seward wrote as follows: "If the law of Great
Britain must be left without amendment, and be construed by the government in
conformity with the rulings of the chief baron of the exchequer, then there will be
left for the United States no alternative but to protect themelves and their com-
merce against armed cruisers proceeding from British ports, as against the naval
forces of a public enemy; and also to claim and insist upon indemnities for the in-
juries which all such expeditions have hitherto committed or shall hereafter
commit against this government and the citizens of the United States. To this
25
Coining, however, to the final paragraph in the extracts
from the despatch of May 21st — that relating to the Treaty
of Paris — it will be noted that the Secretary referred to it as
"abdishing privateering everywhere in all cases and forever'';
he then went on as follows: "You already have our authority
to propose to [Great Britain] our accession to that declara-
tion. If she refuse to receive it, it can only be because she is
willing to become the patron of privateering when aimed at
our devastation." ^
We now come to the true inwardness of the present discus-
sion. What did Seward mean by this language? What was
he driving at? Did he speak in good faith? — or did he have
an ulterior and imdisclosed end always in view, that end to be
attained by indirection? The study becomes interesting, for
it is necessarily made from the dramatis personae point of view.
It involves the correct reading of the individual character of
eminent men at a very critical period historically. What then
was Seward proposing to himself? What considerations actu-
end this government is now preparing a naval force with the utmost vigor; and if
the national navy, which it is rapidly creating, shall not be suflScient for the
emergency, then the United States must bring into employment such private
armed naval forces as the mercantile marine shall afford. . . . Can it be an occa-
sion for either surprise or complaint that if this condition of things is to remain
and receive the deliberate sanction of the British government, the navy of the
United States will receive instructions to pursue these enemies into the ports
which thus, in violation of the law of nations and the obligations of neutrality,
become harbors for the pirates?" In connection with these extracts it should be
observed that the first — that relating to the Florida — occurred at the dose of
December, 1864, when the Civil War was rapidly drawing to a dose. The corre-
spondence, in this case, was submitted to the Cabinet, and the despatch to the
Brazilian minister was approved (Welles, Diary, n. 184-186, 197). There is no
evidence that the previous despatch to Mr. Adams, of July 11, 1863, was sub-
mitted to the Cabinet or had been approved by the President before transmission.
It was not conmiunicated by Mr. Adams to Earl Russell; and when it subse-
quently appeared in the United States Diplomatic Correspondence, "a storm was
raised in the House of Commons. This was not calmed imtil Earl Russell daimed
that as the despatch had never been laid before him, he had been spared the diffi-
culty and pain of giving an appropriate answer to it." (Bancroft, Seward, n.
390.) While the Secretary naturally hesitated to advance such a daim as an
accepted prindple of international law, he seems not to have been unwilling
vagudy to imply as much, venturing on no spedfic proposition. The threat of
a recourse to privateering in certain contingendes which must inevitably have
ensued had the action taken by the WachuseU been ventured upon imder in-
structions in British waters, was expressed in language which could not be termed
even diplomatically veiled.
^ Nicolay and Hay, Lincoln, iv. 273.
26
ated Earl Russell in the course he was presently to take? How
did Mr. Adams, Lord Lyons and Mr. Dayton, who bore the
subordinate parts in the drama, demean themselves?
Seward is primarily to be considered and disposed of. His
was the leading part. He had in the first place annoimced that
dealing with the privateers sailing xmder Confederate letters
of marque was a matter within the exclusive prerogative of the
United States, the Confederacy then (May 21st) not being a
recognized belligerent; and the United States proposed, by
virtue of its mimicipal law, to treat the privateers as pirates.
Seward's scheme imquestionably was, by an adroit though
somewhat transparent move on the diplomatic chess-board, to
force the neutral maritime powers into a position inconsistent
with the law, — whether international or of humanity; that is,
he proposed by giving notice as prescribed to secure the acces-
sion of this country to the stipidations of the Treaty of Paris
imder which privateering was abolished, and then the United
States was, as the sole recognized sovereign nationality, to de-
mand of the Powers that "privateering [being] everywhere and
in all cases and forever" abolished, the Powers must refuse
access to their ports to the Confederate "pirates," as he
designated them. Thus reducing them into the class of crim-
inals or outlaws, — as such to be summarily dealt with.
Such was Seward's scheme, as it first assumed shape in his
mind.
Yet, again, the matter of dates now becomes important.
Seward took the initial step leading to this position April 24th,
— twelve days only after the attack on Smnter. He then noti-
fied the proposed accession of the United States to the Decla-
ration of Paris. The Confederacy had not up to that time any-
where been recognized as a belligerent; and, that being the case,
Seward assumed that the United States, being the "exclusive
sovereign," rightfully and as of course spoke internationally
for the so-called Confederacy as well as for itself.
Unfortimately for the practical working of this theory,
Great Britain and France, acting in co-operation at this junc-
ture, recognized the Confederacy as a belligerent; and then,
xmder all accepted rules of international law, the new belliger-
ent had a right to carry on its operations on water as on land.
Here was a new and somewhat irritating as well as extremely
27
perplexing issue; and again Seward took high ground. As fore-
shadowed in his despatch No. lo, he now insisted that the Con-
federacy was not a belligerent in any full sense of the term until
acknowledged as such by the sovereign power of the United
States. Writing to Mr. Dayton at this time Mr. Seward thus
expressed himself, in a despatch marked "strictly confidential":
You seem to us to have adopted the idea that the insurgents are
necessarily a belligerent power because the British and French Gov-
ernments have chosen in some of their public papers to say that they
are so. . . . Our view is on the contrary. . . . We do not admit,
and we shall never admit, even the fxmdamental statement you as-
sume, namely, that Great Britain and France have recognized the
insurgents as a belligerent .party. True, you say that they have so
declared. We reply: Yes, but tiiey have not declared so to us. You
may rejoin: Their public declaration concludes the fact. We never-
theless reply: It must be not their declarations, but their action
that shall conclude the fact. That action does not yet appear, and
we trust, for the sake of harmony with them and peace throughout
the world, that it will not happen.^
Accordingly, he vaguely claimed that the United States,
not acknowledging the Confederacy as a belligerent, could
treat as it saw fit vessels commissioned by the Montgomery
government as privateers; and, privateers bemg aboKshed by
the Declaration of Paris, they consequently became pirates.
Having thus fixed their status, he furtiier distinctly intimated
an intention to claim that they could be pursued into neutral
ports, and there destroyed as common enemies of mankind.^
Such was apparently the line of procedure somewhat vaguely
formulated in Seward's mind; the ultimate step of which he
held in reserve throughout what are known as the negotiations
relating to the Declaration of Paris, now gravely entered upon.
* Moore, International Law Digest, vn. 574.
' In the case of the Florida the commander of the Wachusett had acted on hia
own responsibility. His proceeding was therefore disavowed with expressions of
regret; and this was to be regarded as "ample reparation" in view of "the en-
during sense of injuries" entertained by the United States. Had, however, the
violation of neutrality taken place by order under the conditions set forth in the
despatch to Mr. Adams of July 11, 1863, the law of nations "afforded an adequate
and proper remedy," that remedy being apparently an offer of ample though
formal reparation, accompanied, of course, in proper cases, by a suitable money
indenmity. See, also, Welles, Diary, n. 185, 197.
28
So much for Secretary Seward. It is now necessary to
turn to the other parties to that negotiation; and first, Earl
Russell.
In the earliest of the discussions which took place in the
Commons (May 2, 1861) after the firing on Sumter, Lord John
Russell, as he then was, used the striking expression that Great
Britain had nothing to do with the American troubles, and
added, "For God's sake, let us, if possible, keep out of them!"
As a statement of fact also, and proposition of international
usage. Lord John Russell stood on firm ground when he further
at this jimcture said in the Commons : " a power or a community
(call it which you will) which [is] at war | with .another, and which
[covers] the sea with its cruisers, must either be acknowledged
as a belligerent, or dealt with as a pirate." ^ The issue was clear
and made up. President Lincoln had by proclamation an-
noimced that those captured on Confederate cruisers or priva-
teers were to be dealt with as pirates. These utterances of
Lord John clearly foreshadowed the position of neutrality the
British Government, of which he was in this matter the mouth-
piece, proposed to assume. That Government was, however,
most distrustful of Secretary Seward personally. Those com-
posing it very generally suspected that he intended to excite
some grave foreign complication in order to bring about a
domestic reconciliation. With this possibility in mind. Lord
John Russell had written to Lord Lyons as long before as Feb-
ruary 20th, as follows: "Supposing, however, that Mr. Lin-
coln, acting imder bad advice, should endeavor to provide
excitement for the pubUc mind by raising questions with Great
Britain, Her Majesty's Grovemment feel no hesitation as to the
policy they would pursue. . . . They would take care to let
the Government which multiplied provocations and sought for
quarrels understand that their forbearance sprung from the con-
sciousness of strength and not from the timidity of weakness."
The British Secretary did not err in this surmise. The idea
of a foreign complication as a coimter-irritant was, as we now
know, distinctly in Seward's mind, even at that early date
(February, 1861). Philosophizing on this problem in the
measured language characteristic of his writings, Mr. Rhodes
says of the Secretary's mental condition four months later:
^ Walpole, Twenty-Jive 7 ears ^ n. 41.
29
The infatuation of Seward is hard to understand; it shows that
the notion which had prompted the "Thoughts for the President's
Consideration" still lodged in his brain, and that he dreamed that
if the United States made war on England because she helped the
Confederacy, the Southerners, by some occult emotional change,
would sink their animosity to tiie North, and join with it for the sake
of overcoming the traditional enemy. His unconcern at the prospect
of serious trouble with England was not comuge, but a recklessness
which made him oblivious of what all discerning Northern statesmen
knew — that the people devoted to the Union had imdertaken quite
enough, in their endeavor to preserve the nation from destruction by
its internal foes.^
In other words, Seward seems to have shared to the full in the
condition of mental intoxication in which the loyal North in-
dulged during the himdred days between Sumter and Bull
Run. The distrust of him, therefore, privately entertained at
that time in diplomatic circles and the departments of
foreign affairs was well founded; far more so than was gener-
ally known, or in America even surmised until the Nicolay-
Hay revelations of twenty years later. Lord Lyons, however,
at once advised Earl Russell of Seward's scheme in the
Declaration of Paris move. In a despatch dated June 4th,
and received in London June 14th, he wrote:
" It is probable that Mr. Adams may, before this despatch reaches
your Lordship,* have offered, on the part of this Government, to ad-
here to Art. I of the Declaration of Paris as well as to the others and
J!
thus to declare privateering to be abolished. There is no doubt that
this adherence will be offered in the expectation that it will bind the
Governments accepting it to treat the privateers of the Southern
Confederacy as pirates. ... At the present moment, however, the
privateers are in full activity, and have met with considerable suc-
cess. It is not, therefore, to be expected that the Southern Confed-
eracy will relinquish the employment of them, otherwise than on
compulsion or in return for some great concession from France and
England." He further added this caution: "It seems to me to be
far from certain that the United States Congress would ratify the
abolition of privateering; nor do I suppose that the Cabinet will abide
by its proposal when it finds that it will gain nothing towards the
suppression of the Southern privateering by doing so."
^ Rhodes, m. 424.
30
The ultimate purpose of Seward's move on the international
chess-board was, therefore, understood in the British Foreign
Office; and, of course. Earl Russell did not propose to be
xmwittingly a victim of it. Accordingly, xmder date of July
12, 1861, he was thus writing to Edward Everett in Boston,
knowing well that the latter was in correspondence with Mr.
Adams in London:
^'l respect the unanimous feeling of the North, and still more the
resolution not to permit the extension of Slavery which led to the
election of President Lincohi. But with regard to our own course
I must say something more. There were according to yoiu: account
eight millions of freemen in the Slave States. Of these millions up-
wards of five have been for some time in open revolt against the
President and Congress of the United States. It is not oiir practice
to treat five millions of freemen as pirates, and to hang their sailors
if they stop oxu: merchantmen. But unless we meant to treat them
as pirates and to hang them, we could not deny them belligerent
rights. This is what you and we did in the case of tie South American
Colonies of Spain. Your own President and Courts of Law decided
this question in the case of Venezuela.^
^ Adams Mss. Enclosure in Everett to Adams , August 20, 1861. Proceed'
ings, XLV. 76, 77.
[In view of the correspondence which is known to have passed between the
Premier and the Editor of the Times just prior to the Trent affair, four months
later, it is safe to assume that the Times was at this jimcture directly inspired from
Government sources. In its editorial columns of the issue pf May 15th, the
following comment appeared on the Proclamation of Belligerency, then just
published:
"The North sees in the Southern States rebels against its authority, and will
probably, at first at least, decline to recognize the validity of Letters of Marque
issued imder the authority of President Jefferson Davis. The South will not be
slow to retaliate, and it may easily be anticipated that there will be a disposition
on both sides to treat those crews of privateers who may fall into their heuids as
pirates, to whom the license they bear gives no protection. What would be the
conduct of the British Government under such circumstances? Suppose an
Englishman taken on board a Southern privateer to be hanged under a sentence
of a Court of Admiralty at New York, — what would be the conduct of the Gov-
ernment in this country? The answer of the Proclamation to the question is by
no means encouraging. Persons enlisting in such service will do so at their peru
and of their own wrong, and will in no wise obtain any protection from us against
any liabilities or penal consequences. It will be observed that in this place the
word 'such' is omitted. The liabilities and penal consequences are not confined
to those imder the Act or imder the law of nations, but are left wide and imde-
fined, as if on purpose to impress the very case we are supposing. . . . We have
done our duty if we distinctly point out that those Englishmen who, in defiance
of the laws of their country and the solemn warnings of their Sovereign, rush into
this execrable conflict will do so with direct notice that if they meet with enemies
31
Meanwhile, Seward, by what has always, for some reason not
at once apparent, passed for a very astute proceeding,^ caused
a transfer of the whole negotiation from Washington to London
and Paris, — that is, he refused to see the representatives of
France and Great Britain together, and xmder instructions act-
ing jointly in reference to the accession of the United States
to the Declaration of Paris; and by so doing caused the ne-
gotiations to pass out of his own hands into those of his
two representatives in Europe, Mr. Adams and Mr. Dayton.^
They, July 6th, were instructed accordingly, and proceeded to
negotiate.
Dates and conditions must again be borne in mind. The
instructions to negotiate on the basis of the treaty of Paris
"pure and simple," bore date of July 6th, just fifteen days
before the battle of Bull Run, and when the movement which
led to that disaster was fully decided upon and in active prepa-
ration. So far as foreign relations were concerned, Seward was
as reckless and merciless as themselves, they must bear the fate that awaits them,
without any hope that the country whose laws they have broken will stretch forth
her arm to shield them from the consequences of their own folly and wickedness.
. . . The warning has been given in time; we hope and believe that it will prove
effectual, and that the horrors of a civil war between brethren will not be aggra-
vated by the uncalled-for intervention of the subjects of the parent State."
It would thus appear that from the commencement Great Britain was upon its
guard. Under the circimistances, it was not proposed to protect British subjects
therein concerned in case privateering was visited with the penalty of piracy. On
the other hand, the British Government did not propose, through a deferred adhe-
sion to the Treaty of Paris by the United States, to be drawn into a denial of
light of asylum to a recognized belligerent. Ed.]
^ Seward ai Washington, n. 581; Bancroft, Seward, n. 181.
' "Mr. Seward said at once that he could not receive from us a commimica-
tion founded on the assumption that the Southern rebels were to be regarded as
beUigerents; that this was a determination to which the Cabinet had come deliber-
ately; that he could not admit that recent events had in any respect altered the
relations between foreign Powers and the Southern States; that he would not
discuss the question with us, but that he should give instructions to the United
States Ministers in London and Paris, who would be thus enabled to state the
reasoiLs for the course taken by their Government to your Lordship and to M.
Thouvenel, if you should be desirous to hear them.
"*That is to say,' observed M. Mercier, 'you prefer to treat the question in
Paris and London rather than with us here.'
"'Just so,' said Mr. Seward; and he proceeded to tell us that he should be
very much obliged if we would, on our side, leave with him, for his own use only,
our instructions, in order that he might be able to write his despatches to London
and Paris with a certainty that he did not misapprehend the views of our Govern-
ments." Lord Lyons to Lord John RusseU, June 17, z86i.
32
then still riding a very high horse, — the No. lo charger, in
fact, he had moimted on the 21st of the previous May. We
get a vivid and exceedingly life-like glimpse of him, his attitude
and way of talking at just this jimcture through Russell's
Diary. The Times special correspondent there describes how
on July 4th — while the despatches ordering the Declaration of
Paris negotiations to proceed were yet on Mr. Seward's table,
to go out two days later — he (Russell) called at the Depart-
ment of State. He reports the impression in the course of that
interview made on him by Seward, recording his language
thus:
' " We are dealing with an insurrection within our own country, of
our own people, and the Government of Great Britain have thought
fit to recognize that insurrection before we were able to bring the
strength of the Union to bear against it, by conceding to it the status
of belligerent. Although we might justly complain of such an un-
friendly act in a manner that might injure the friendly relations be-
tween the two countries, we do not desire to give any excuse for
foreign interference; although we do not hesitate, in case of necessity,
to resist it to the uttermost, we have less to fear from a foreign war
than any country in the world. If any European Power provokes a
war, we shall not shrink from it. A contest between Great Britain
and the United States would wrap the world in fire, and at the end
it would not be the United States which would have to lament the
results of the conflict."
I could not but admire the confidence — may I say the coohiess?
— of the statesman who sat in his modest little room within the sound
of the enemy's guns, in a capital menaced by their forces who spoke
so fearlessly of war with a Power which could have blotted out the
paper blockade of the Southern ports and coast in a few hours, and,
in conjunction with the Southern armies, have repeated the occupa-
tion and destruction of the capital.
To the historical investigator of 191 2 the foregoing accoimt
of a familiar talk with Secretary Seward in July, 1861, just a
fortnight before the disaster at Bull Run, is distinctly sugges-
tive; as also is Russell's comment on what then passed. To
us who, seeing before and after, look back on the situation at
that period, it is curious to consider what possibilities were in
the mind of Secretary Seward when he thus, speaking for the
United States, calmly contemplated the contingency of a war
33
with the two leading naval powers of Europe, imposed upon
the somewhat gigantic task of suppressing a domestic insurrec-
tion in which eleven distinct political communities were con-
cerned, representing eight miUions of population. We now
know, and it would seem as if Secretary Seward could at the
time hardly have failed to realize, that the task of suppressing
the insurrection alone taxed to the utmost both the strength
and the spirit of persistence of that portion of the United States
which remained loyal to the Union. We also now appreciate
the strategic fact that every vital military operation involved
in that gigantic effort depended on maritime control.^ From
the capture of New Orleans by Farragut, through Sherman's
inarch to the sea to Lee's surrender at Appomattox, it may
with safety be asserted that, with the exception of the Vicks-
burg and Chattanooga operations, there was not one even con-
siderable operation which would have been possible had the
national government been imable to sustain itself as the domi-
nant sea power. This, as respects the domestic situation. And
yet in July, 1861, Secretary Seward did not hesitate to profess
his implicit confidence in the ability of the national government
both to overcome the Confederacy and successfully to meet any
possible combination of European nations, or, as he himself
put it, to "suppress rebellion and defeat invasion besides."^
What then had he in mind when so f requenUy indulging in the
metaphorical prediction that "a contest between Great Britain
and the United States would wrap the world in fire"? This
prediction, too, he now uttered when actively negotiating for
the accession of the United States to what was known as the
Declaration of Paris, by which "privateering is and remains
abolished."
I am not aware that Secretary Seward ever, either in his
correspondence or in any conversation of which we have a
record, enlarged upon this subject in detail. In the course of
a despatch to Mr. Adams, written on the morrow of Bull Run,
he thus expressed himself: "If, through error, on whatever
side, this dvil contention shall transcend the national bounds
and involve foreign States, the energies of all commercial na-
tions, including our own, will necessarily be turned to war, and
a general carnival of the adventurous and the reckless of all
* 2 Proceedings, xrx. 311-326, • Barnes, Thurlow Weed, n. 410.
34
countries, at the cost of the existing commerce of the world,
must ensue." ^ This is suggestive; but a more detailed and
^ To trace conjectiirally the line of thought or reasoning pursued by Seward in
the presence of the quite imforeseeable phases assumed by the course of events at
this juncture has a distinct psychological interest, and is, moreover, essential to
any correct understanding of his acts and utterances. Essentially an imaginative
man, Seward had also, as Bancroft points out (n. 505), a strong emotional and
sentimental side to his character. To this was largely due his unbounded faith in
the spirit of nationality in the American people, and his impulse to an appeal to
patriotism in presence of a domestic complication. This faith was in him un-
boimded, and foimd frequent and at times eloquent expression. It in^ired, we
know, the fine closing sentiment of Lincoln's first inaugural, with its poetic
reference to the "mystic chords of memory" swelling the "chorus of the Union."
Nicolay-Hay, m. 323, 343. Later it caused Seward to write exhortingly to Mr.
Sumner in the midst of a most acute crisis in our foreign relations: "Rouse the
nationality of the American people. It is an instinct upon which you can always
rely, even when the conscience that ought never to slumber is drugged to death.' '
A passage of similar tenor is quoted by Bancroft (n. 183) from a despatch to Day-
ton: "Down deep in the heart of the American people — deeper than the love of
trade, or of freedom — deeper than the attachment to any local or sectional inter-
est, or partisan pride or individual ambition — deeper than any other sentiment
— is that one out of which the Constitution of this Union arose — namely, Ameri-
can Independence — independence of all foreign control, alliance, or influence."
With this faith in the possibility of an appeal to what he considered an irresistible
power when aroused, Seward's memory insensibly went back to the traditions of
the War of 181 2, and his own impressions based on features of that struggle and
recollection of its phases and incidents; for, bom in May, 1801, Seward was at
the impressionable age of fourteen when the war closed. The part then played by
the American privateers is familiar history. Reverting to that national ex-
perience, Seward, like President Buchanan, appears to have reasoned somewhat
as follows:
(i) " Our most effectual means of annoying a great naval power upon the ocean
is by granting letters of marque and reprisal." {Supra, 8.) >
(2) In certain emergencies, he declared, "we must let loose our privateers."
(Welles, Diary, i. 437.)
(3) Finding their way to every sea, these privateers will "wrap the whole
world in flames. No power so remote that she will not feel the fire of our battle
and be burned by our conflagration." (Russell, My Diary, December 16,
1861.)
(4) Consequently, any struggle in which we may be involved will be "dread-
ful, but the end will be sure and swift." {Seward at Washington, n. 575.)
In pursuing some such line of reasoning, and in reaching this conclusion,
Seward, as is now obvious, left out of consideration the vital fact that since 1815
steam had replaced canvas in naval operations. Jefferson Davis at the same
time, but on the other side, made the same mistake. Sustained privateering was,
therefore, possible in 1861 only for vessels propelled by steam. This the Con-
federacy c^ly learned. So far as appears, it does not seem to have occurred to
Secretary Seward that in case of hostilities with the leading nations of Europe
practically every foreign port in the world would have been closed to American
vessels. It would have been impossible for them to hold the sea. The blockade
of the Confederacy would have been raised, and the loyal States would have been
in turn blockaded. Under these circumstances, the ^jnerican privateer, could it
35
fairly adequate idea of what was then in Seward's mind can
perhaps be derived from the Diary of Mr. Welles, who himself
seems to have participated to a somewhat inexplicable extent
in the highly conflagratory confidence of his colleague. Secretary
Welles certainly did not as a habit share the views of Mr.
Seward; but none the less, writing at a period two years later
and even more critical, he on this "wrap-the-world-in-fire"
topic thus expressed himself:
A war with England would be a serious calamity to us, but scarcely
less serious to her. She cannot afford a maritime conflict with us,
even in our troubles, nor will she. We can live within ourselves if
worse comes to worse. Our territory is compact, facing both oceans,
and in latitudes which furnish us in abimdance without foreign aid
all the necessaries and most of the luxuries of life; but England has
a colonial system which was once her strength, but is her weakness in
these da)rs and with such a people as our countrymen to contend with.
Her colonies are scattered over the globe. We could, with our public
and private armed ships, interrupt and destroy her communication
with her dependencies, her colonies, on which she is as dependent for
prosperity as they on her. I was therefore in favor of meeting her
face to face, asking only what is right but submitting to nothing that
is wrong.
K the late despatches are to be taken as the policy she intends to
pursue, it means war, and if war is to come it looks to me as of a
magnitude greater than the world has ever experienced, — as if it
have kept the sea, would have had no port of a foreign country m which to get
supplies or into which to send its prizes; and the ports of its own country, where
machinery could have been repaired and coal obtained, would have been closed.
Hence every inducement as well as facility for privateering would have ceased
to exist. The ports of the Confederacy would meanwhile have been opened, with
a consequent imobstructed movement of cotton to Europe, and a coimter im-
obstructed movement of arms, munitions and stores to the Confederacy.
Under such circumstances, it would seem as if Secretary Seward indulged in a
delusion no less deceptive and dangerous than that at the same time indulged in
by Jefferson Davis over the potency of cotton as a finally controlling factor in
modem politics as well as trade. The maintenance of the blockade of the Con-
federacy, in fact, was essential to the success of the national government; and,
whatever else might have resulted from a foreign intervention, had it occurred
during the Civil War, the United States would have lost its control of the sea and
the blockade of the Confederacy would have been raised. It is difl&cult now to sec
how in such case the cause of the Union could have been sustained. If his reasoning
was really that indicated by his utterances, ofl&dal and familiar, and they were not
for mere effect, Mr. Seward would on this subject seem to have been wrong in his
every premise. He left out of his equation not only steam and electricity but a half
century of scientific development.
36
would eventuate in the upheaval of nations, the overthrow of gov-
ernments and dynasties. The S3nnpathies of the mass of mankind
would be with us rather than with the decaying d3aiasties and the
old effete governments. Not unlikely the conflict thus commenced
would kindle the torch of dvil war throughout Christendom, and even
nations beyond.*
The condition of affairs opens a vast field. Should a commercial
war commence, it will affect the whole world. The police of the seas
will be broken up, and the peaceful intercourse of nations destroyed.
Those governments and peoples that have encouraged and are foster-
ing our dissensions will themselves reap the bitter fruits of their
malicious intrigues. In this great conflict, thus wickedly begun there
will be likely to ensue an uprising of the nations that wiU shatter
existing governments and overthrow the aristocracies and dynasties
not only of England but of Eun^.'
Two men, mentally so differently constituted, thus concurred
in what, involving as it did the mastery of the sea, cannot but
impress the modem investigator as a singularly visionary and
delusive hallucination. Nevertheless, it would seem that
W. H. Russell was right when, on another occasion, he debated
in his own mind whether Secretary Seward believed in the
somewhat "tall" talk in which on this subject he was apt to
indulge. After meditating the proposition carefully, Russell
concluded that the Secretary really did have faith in the views
he expressed.^ Under the circumstances, it is diflicult to avoid
1 Diaryy i. 258-259.
' Diary y I. 251. The following passage from a speech delivered in the House of
Representatives by Thaddeus Stevens, of Pennsylvania, December 30, 186 1, is
of a similar tenor. Mr. Stevens was chairman of the Committee of Wajrs and
Means, and the entire speech is curiously suggestive of the rhodomontade very
generally indulged in at that stage of the conflict:
"War is alwa3rs a mighty evil. With England it would be especially deplor-
able. But war with all nations is better than national dishonour and disgrace.
We should be better able to meet England in arms with the rebel States in alli-
ance with her than if they were still loyal. They have a vastly extended defence-
less frontier easily accessible by a maritime enemy. Most of the army and navy
of the nation during the last war were required for its defence. If we were relieved
from protecting them, we could use all oxa forces in other quarters. We should
then do what we ought long since to have done — organize their domestic enemies
against them, who would find themselves and their allies suJQEicient employment
at home without invading the North. If such a deplorable war shoidd be forced
upon us we should do what we ought to have done in the last war — rectify our
Eastern and Northern boundaries; and our banner would wave over freemen,
and none but republican freemen, from the Gulf of Mexico to the Arctic Ocean,
and from the Bay of St. Lawrence to Puget Sound."
• My Diary, April 4, 1861.
37
the conclusion reached by Secretary Welles in other connections,
that Secretary Seward was in his mental make-up essentially
visionary and erratic.^ He was also, as Mr. Sumner asserted,
somewhat wanting in what is known as hard, common sense.^
Nevertheless, these characteristics again must be taken with
qualifications. While Seward was visionary and to an excep-
tional and unfortunate degree addicted to prophetic utterance,
yet, as a saving grace, he rarely allowed his visions to commit
him to any action involving irretrievable disaster; while, as
respects his erratic tendencies, when boldly challenged he be-
came, as Mr. Welles asserted, "timid, uncertain, and distrust-
ful";* and, "while thus lacking in a dangerous tenacity of
purpose, he was naturally disposed to oblique and indirect
movements. With an almost phenomenal quickness of appre-
hension, however, he possessed "wonderful faciKty and aptness
in adapting himself to circumstances and exigencies which he
could not control, and a fertiHty in expedients, with a dexterity
in adopting or dismissing plans and projected schemes, unsur-
passed.''* Very similar conclusions in these respects were
reached by Mr. Bancroft, when he wrote in his Life: "There
was in Seward's nature so much that was emotional and senti-
mental aside from what was subtle, and it was so common for
him to seek to accomplish his purpose by indirect means, that
it is often impossible to distinguish impulse from calculation." ^
Reverting now to the narrative, it is well to bear in mind
that, at the very hour Russell's description of the call at the
State Department was recorded, the crisis was impending;
seventeen days later only "the strength of the Union" was to be
brought to bear against the Confederacy, with results which
would render it difficult to deny the latter the status of a bel-
ligerent. Our somewhat hastily improvised and extremely vain-
glorious martial array was to be chased back to Washington in
panic flight by "the power existing in pronunciamento only."
So much for the situation as, in the period of this episode, it
aflFected Seward's mental operations and plans of procedure.
There can, I think, be no reasonable doubt of the program he
had in mind up to Bull Run; but, five months later, that pro-
gram and the sequence of events were clearly set forth by
* Welles, Diary 1 1. ii, 275. * 7ft., 285. ■ 76., 153, 154.
* Welles, Lincoln and Seward^ 43. • Bancroft, n. 505.
38
Lyons in a despatch to Earl Russell, dated December 6, 1861,
and received in London December 25tli, at the very crisis of
the subsequent Trent affair. Lyons wrote :
A great deal of the space [in the diplomatic correspondence accom-
panying the President's message that day published] devoted to [Eng-
land and France] is occupied by the negotiations concerning the
adherence of the United States to the Declaration of Paris. Mr.
Adams writes frequently and at great length concerning his mis-
apprehension of yoiu: Lordship's intentions as to transferring the
negotiation to Washington. The simple explanation of this misap-
prehension is, that Mr. Seward refused to see the despatch in which
your Lordship's proposals were made. Yoiu: Lordship will recollect
that Mr. Seward, having been permitted by M. Merrier and me to
read and consider in private that despatch, and a despatch of a sim-
ilar tenor from the Government of France, refused to receive the
formal copies we were instructed to place in his hands, or to take any
offirial notice of their contents. . . . From several of the papers now
published, it appears that it was only an act of common prudence,
on the part of the Governments of Great Britain and France, not to
accept the accession of this coimtry to the Declaration of Paris, with-
out stating distinctly what obhgations they intended by doing so to
assume with regard to the Seceded States. Little doubt can remain,
after reading the papers, that the accession was offered solely with
a view to the effect it would have on the privateering operations
of the Southern States; and that a refusal on the part of England
and France, after having accepted the accession, to treat the South-
em privateers as pirates, would have been made a serious grievance,
if not a groimd of quarrel. ... In the letter from Mr. Seward to Mr.
Dayton of the 2 2d Jime, the following passage occurs: "We shall
continue to regard France as respecting om: Government imtil she
practically acts in violation of her friendly obligations to us, as
we understand them. When she does that, it will be time enough
to inquire whether if we accede to the Treaty of Paris she could,
after that, allow pirates upon our commerce shelter in her ports, and
what our remedy should then be. We have no fear on this head."
Had, therefore, the movement to Bull Run resulted differ-
ently, as Mr. Seward confidently believed it would, he had it
in mind then to assume an aggressive attitude, boldly disclos-
ing his ultimate object. He would insist on United States
sovereignty, and the outlawing of all Confederate cruisers as
pirates imder the laws of the United States become operative
39
as respects them by virtue of the adhesion of that country to
the Declaration of Paris.
But, weeks before the 21st of July, and its catastrophe, the
Declaration of Paris negotiation had passed out of Seward's
hands into the hands of Messrs. Adams and Dayton.
Their personalities and views of the situation have next to be
considered.
Mr. Adams seems to have approached the negotiation in
perfect good faith, holding that the articles of the Declara-
tion of Paris were right in themselves, constituting a distinct
advance in international law; and, being right, they should
be acceded to by the United States on their merits and in good
faith. He did not contemplate an ulterior move; had no eye
to possible impending complications; nor did he apparently
grasp Seward's scheme in all its consequences. He, therefore,
proceeded in a straightforward way to negotiate the accession
of the United States to the Paris Declaration. In so doing he
acted as it was inomibent on a diplomatic agent to act. He
carried out his instructions in a spirit of obedience, and with
imquestioning loyalty to his chief.
Mr. Dayton otherwise viewed the thing proposed. He ap-
prehended early trouble between the United States and Great
Britain, and considered that in such contingency privateering
was a weapon of aggressive warfare which the United States
should on no account abandon. He was, therefore, most re-
luctant to carry out his instructions, and did so only when
they reached him in positive and explicit terms.
What policy and scheme of subsequent, alternative action
were in Secretary Seward's mind when he forwarded those in-
structions, looking to the adherence of the United States to
the Articles of the Declaration of Paris "pure and simple"
can only now be matter of surmise. One thing would seem ap-
parent. Secretary Seward at this juncture looked forward to
serious foreign complications as at least probable. Neither in
case of such complications does he seem to have proposed in
any event so to commit the United States that in case of emer-
gency a recourse could not be had to privateering as an effective
weapon in warfare, especially in the case of Great Britain. On
the contrary, both in his own utterances and in the Diary
records of Secretary Welles a resort to letters of marque in
40
the event of a foreign complication when the world would be
"wrapped in fire" seems to be assimied as a matter of course.^
In the absence of any direct avowal, which could, imder the
circimistances, hardly be looked for, the inevitable inference,
therefore, is that in such eventuality the American Secretary
of State, with his "wonderful facility and aptness in adapting
himself to circumstances and exigencies which he could not
control," and his "fertility in expedients, combined with dex-
terity in adopting or dismissing plans and projected schemes," «
proposed to extricate himself from a commitment then become
undesirable by asserting that through their refusal to recognize
the cruisers of the Confederacy as pirates the foreign powers
had themselves disregarded the Declaration of Paris with re-
spect to privateering, thus releasing the United States from its
obligations.
Through such confusion of thought and juggling of phrases
the Secretary of State apparently saw a path clear before him
in any eventuality. The United States was to find itself free
to a recourse to what in the absence of the Declaration of Paris
had always been regarded as a legitimate method of warfare.
As usual, the onus of the violated obligation would have been
transferred to the other parties thereto.
The British representative at Washington, Lord Lyons, was
the only dramatis persona in these negotiations remaining to be
considered. Of him it may fairly be said that his course through-
out seems to furnish no ground for criticism. Placed in a most
difficult position, and apparently at times treated by Mr.
Seward with scant personal and official courtesy, he bore himself
with quiet dignity, preserving an even temper and performing
admirably his duties. His reports and despatches have not as
yet been made accessible in full; but, so far as appears, acting
loyally to his chief and paying obedience, both strict and tact-
ful, to his instructions, he kept the British Foreign Office accu-
rately and fully informed as to the course of events. Moreover,
he seems to have xmderstood his opponent, correctly divining
his plan of operations and ulterior purpose. That he distrusted
^ A most annoying and destructive weapon of warfare, the "wolves of the sea**
were bitterly denounced by the American Secretary of the Navy at the very time
when, in case of a conflict with Great Britain, recourse would, he declared, be had
to "letters of marque and every means in our power." Diary , i. 250.
> Welles, Lincoln and Seward, 43.
41
Mr. Seward and considered him very capable of covert dealing
was well understood in Washington. This was the case to such a
degree that Mr. Sumner told Secretary Welles that the British
Minister had given him to understand that he was "cautious
and careful in all his transactions" with the Secretary, and
that he "made it a point to reduce all matters with Seward of
a public nature to writing." ^ Nevertheless, owing doubtless
to his tact, good temper, and the confidence in hhnself Lord
Lyons had inspired, Mr. Welles later on recorded the following
belief: "To a mortifying extent Lord Lyons shapes and directs,
through the Secretary of State, an erroneous policy to this
government. This is humiliating, but true." ^
That, in the case of Mr. Seward, the judgment of Gideon
Welles was biased and almost invariably harsh and unfavor-
able, is apparent. He is a prejudiced witness. None the less,
a shrewd and incisive judge of character, and a very honest
man, the Secretary of the Navy saw things in Lincoln's cabinet
from the inside, — his sources of information were the best and
most direct. That he was misinformed as to foreign affairs
and not infrequently mistaken as well as rash in his judgments
concerning them, is apparent from his contemporaneous records;
and yet, making all possible allowance on these heads, it is not
easy to see how a higher official tribute than that here paid by
him could well have been paid to the Minister of a foreign coim-
try during a most critical period.
Perhaps, however, the best r6sum6 of the situation in Jxme,
1861, so far as Lord Lyons was concerned, is to be foimd in W. H.
Russell's Diary. He there (chapter xliv) records the fact that
returning from his trip through the Confederacy, and reaching
Washington on the3d of July, he found Lord Lyons at the British
Legation, and was sorry to observe that he looked "rather care-
worn and pale." As a result of what he then learned he further
stated that Mr. Seward, as the Southern Confederacy developed
its power, assmned ever higher groxmd, and became more ex-
acting and defiant. He went on as follows, referring to what had
recently taken place:
Mr. Seward has been fretful, irritable, and acrimonious; and it is
not too much to suppose Mr. Sumner has been useful in allaying
* Wefles, Diary ^ i. 288. • Diary, i. 399, 409.
42
irritation. A certain despatch was written last June, which amounted
to little less than a declaration of war against Great Britain. Most
fortunately the President was induced to exercise his power. The
despatch was modified though not without opposition, and was for-
warded to the English Minister with its teeth drawn. Lord Lyons,
who is one of the suavest and quietest of diplomatists, has found it
difficult, I fear, to maintain personal relations with Mr. Seward at
times. Two despatches have been prepared for Lord John Russell,
which could have had no result but to lead to a breach of the peace,
had not some friendly interpositor succeeded in averting the wrath of
the Foreign Minister.^
So far as the second, third and fourth articles of the Declara-
tion of Paris were concerned, they in the negotiation now
carried on presented no difficulty. The question turned wholly
on the first, — that is, "Privateering is and remains abolished."
As respects this, the battle of Bull Run entirely changed the
diplomatic situation. After July 21, 1 861, it was practically
out of the question to deny that the Confederates were bellig-
erents, and, on land or sea, to be treated as such. Never-
theless, the attempted confusion of Confederate cruisers duly
conmiissioned, with privateers sailing imder letter of marque,
and these with piracy, was pressed imtil the following October,
Then at last those captured on one of the Confederate conmierce-
destroyers were brought to trial, and a member of the crew of
the JeS Davis was convicted and sentenced to death.^ Of
course the sentence was not executed; and the farce, prolonged,
as such since July 21, then came to a close; and with it one of
Seward's most involved diplomatic schemes.
The United States simply had to back down; or, as Seward
the day following the battle wrote to his wife, — "nothing re-
mains but to reorganize and begin again." '
The European negotiations had, however, already languished
to a conclusion, all the diplomatic formalities being duly ob-
served. Before the tidings of the catastrophe of July 21 reached
Europe, the negotiation had come to a head. A formal conven-
tion was concluded (July 18) for the adhesion of the United
States to the Declaration of Paris, and awaited signature; but
on July 31st Earl Russell, just as the news of what had occurred
* Russdl, Diary, 377. K » Seivard at Washingian, n. 600.
' Rhodes, m. 429; Nicolay and Hay, v. xo. i
43
at Bull Run was about to reach London, took occasion to notify
Mr. Adams that, if the proposed convention should be signed,
the engagement on the part of Great Britain would be "pro-
spective,'' and would "not invalidate anything already done."
In transmitting the correspondence to Secretary Seward, Mr.
Adams somewhat naively observed that he did not understand
the meaning of this phrase. In other words, it would appear that
the ingenious confusion of terms — belligerency, sovereignty,
insurgency. Confederate cruisers, letters of marque, privateer-
ing, pirates and piracy, the last five being in the plan of Mr.
Seward interchangeable — the significance, I say, of this con-
fusion of terms had not occurred to the American negotiator.
It was, however, very present in the minds of both the British
Foreign Secretary and the American Secretary of State. But at
just this juncture, and while Mr. Adams was meditating the
problem, tidings reached him of what had occurred in front of
Washington on the 21st of the previous month. This was on
August 4th; and the American negotiator had good occasion
to write in his diary, "Thus a change is made in aU our ex-
pectations, and the war from this time assimies a new char-
acter. My own emotion is not to be described."
Applying to Secretary Seward for further instructions, Mr.
Adams was presently advised that the word "prospective" in
Earl Russell's enigmatic statement was considered "unim-
portant"; but the declaration that the signature of the con-
vention should "not invalidate anything already done" was
suggestive of difl&culties. Would Earl Russell kindly specify?
This despatch did not reach Mr. Adams until after August 28th,
— twenty-four days after the news of Bull Run had got to
London, establishing the fact of Confederate belligerency be-
yond peradventure. Mr. Adams had then as the result of
further correspondence already received a despatch from Earl
Russell, prepared evidently in the full light of the recent military
occurrence which had worked a change so material in all the
American minister's "expectations." This despatch was con-
clusive. So far as "specification" was concerned, it certainly
left nothing to inference. Earl Russell now wrote :
It was most desirable in framing a new agreement not to give rise
to a fresh dispute.
But the different attitude of Great Britain and of the United
44
States in regard to the internal dissensions now unhappily prevail-
ing in the United States gave warning that such a dispute might
arise out of the proposed convention.
Her Majesty's Government, upon receiving intelligence that the
President had declared by proclamation his intention to blockade
the ports of nine of the States of the Union, and that Mr. Davis,
speaking in the name of those nine States, had declared his intention
to issue letters of marque and reprisals, and having also received
certain information of the design of both sides to arm, had come to
the conclusion that dvil war existed in America, and Her Majesty
had thereupon proclaimed her neutrality in the approaching contest.
The Government of the United States, on the other hand, spoke
only of unlawful combinations, and designated those concerned in
them as rebels and pirates. It would follow logically and consistently,
from the attitude taken by Her Majesty's Government, that the
so-called Confederate States, being acknowledged as a belligerent,
might, by the law of nations, arm privateers, and that their priva-
teers must be regarded as the armed vessels of a belligerent.
With equal logic and consistency it would follow, from the posi-
tion taken by the United States, that the privateers of the Southern
States might be decreed to be pirates, and it might be further argued
by the Government of the United States that a European power
signing a convention with the United States, declaring that priva-
teering was and remains abolished, would be bound to treat the pri-
vateers of the so-called Confederate States as pirates.
Hence, instead of an agreement, charges of bad faith and violation
of a convention might be brought in the United States against the
power signing such a convention, and treating the privateers of the
so-called Confederate States as those of a belligerent power.
f Not unnaturally, in view of the facts which have here been
recounted, and the inferences almost necessarily to be drawn
from them. Secretary Sewatd in due time (September 7th) pro-
nounced the proposed reservation quite "inadmissible." And
here the curtain finally fell on this somewhat prolonged and
not altogether creditable diplomatic farce.^
What, however, now seems more particularly to deserve
attention in a study of this episode is the extreme danger appar-
^ [In his annual message to Congress in December, 1861, President Lincoln said:
''Although we have failed to induce some of the commercial powers to adopt a
desirable melioration of the rigor of maritime war, we have removed all obstruc-
tions from the way of this humane reform except such as are merely of temporary
and accidental occurrence." £d.]
45
ently incurred therein by the United States. Indeed, without
its being realized by any one, the country then seems to have
practically challenged a greater peril than ever confronted it,
with a single exception, through the succeeding years. All, in
fact, depended upon the good faith of Earl Russell in pursuance
of his policy of neutrality. Earl Russell, by great good luck,
chanced to be a conventional British statesman; but had he
been a man more of the Bismarckian type, and seen the situa-
tion clearly, the result would, if Mr. Henry Adams's view of the
situation is correct, have been inevitable. He, in his paper, as-
sumes, and undertakes to show, that Earl Russell throughout
this episode acted evasively, practically in bad faith, and with
an ulterior and concealed end always in view. That end was
the early recognition of the Confederacy, and a consequent
division of the United States. From the outset, as Mr. Henry
Adams asserts, Earl Russell wanted to put the American Min-
ister in the position of representing a portion only of a divided
country, and there hold him.
But if this assumption is correct, the whole game was, in the
negotiation which has been described, thrown by Secretary
Seward into Earl Russell's hands. All the latter had to do was
at once to accede to the proposal of the United States, and
admit it by convention to the Articles of the Declaration of
Paris. He would then have left the Secretary of State to get
the assent of the Senate to that convention; which, however,
Lord Lyons had already advised would, imder the circmn-
stances, be very difficult to obtain. This, however, a Bis-
marckian diplomat, if Mr. Henry Adams's theory as to the
attitude of Russell and the British ministry is correct, would
not have regarded. It would, in fact, in no way have concerned
him. He would simply have acknowledged the right to accede,
and claimed that, so far as the United States was concerned,
''Privateering was and would remain abolished " thereby.
The next inevitable step would have followed, and that
soon. Seward, as Secretary of State, would have insisted
that the United States spoke for the Confederacy, and, the
Confederacy not being a belligerent recognized by the United
States, the letters of marque issued by it constituted a license
for piracy under the American law; and the American law on
that point must be held to prevail. The cruisers of the unrec-
46
ognized de facto government had consequently no status on the
ocean. They were not even privateers within the purview of
the Declaration of Paris. They were simply pseudo-commis-
sioned corsairs. A year later he angrily referred to them as
" piratical cruisers," the presence of whidi on the ocean seemed
"to leave to the United States at most no hope of remaining at
peace with Great Britain without sacrifices for which no peace
could ever compensate." ^ And again seventeen months later,
under date of December 8, 1862, he said that up to a time
shortly before, there was " a prevailing consciousness on our
part that we were not yet fully prepared for a foreign war.
This latter conviction is passing away. It is now apparent to
observing and considerate men that no European state is as
really capable to do us harm as we are capable to defend our-
selves. . . . The whole case may be simimed up in this: The
United States claim, and they must continually claim, that
in this war they are a whole sovereign nation, and entitled
to the same respect as such that they accord to Great
Britain. Great Britain does not treat them as such a sov-
ereign, and hence all the evils that disturb their intercourse
and endanger their friendship." ^
Assuming this attitude a year earlier, — and it apparently
was Seward's next projected move on the diplomatic chess-
board, as the pieces stood thereon after the firing on Sumter
and before the Bull Run catastrophe, — the plain opportunity
would then have presented itself to the Bismarckian states-
man having the program in view which Mr. Henry Adams
attributes^to Earl Russell. The reply would have been an im-
mediate and emphatic, "Very well; all that being so, we will
now recognize the Confederacy as a member of the family of
nations. After that, there can be no question whatever as to
public commerce-destroyers, privateers or pirates. Every
vessel sailing under its flag will be as much a public ship of
war as one sailing under the flag of the United States. But,
so far as the United States is concerned, ' Privateering is, and
remains, abolished!'"
^ Geneva Award Record, Correspondence concerning Claims against Great
Britain, October 20, 1862, i. 260.
* Geneva Award Record, Correspondence concerning Claims against Great
Britain, October 20, 1862, i. 261.
47
Seward would, by his course, have thus brought about the
very result the United States had greatest cause to apprehend
and most desired to avoid. In other words, he would have fallen
headlong into the somewhat obviously yawning pit he had elab-
orately designed for others.
How perilously near the country came to the verge of that
pit is made apparent in Mr. Bancroft's accoimt of what was
known as the Consul Bunch incident,^ which occurred contem-
poraneously. Into the details of this incident it is not neces-
sary here to enter. It is sufficient to say that while the nego-
tiation for the adhesion of the United States to the Declaration
of Paris was in progress in Europe, Robert Bunch, British Con-
sul at Charleston, was carrying on something bearing a strong
resemblance to a diplomatic intrigue looking to a partial adhe-
sion at least of the Confederate Government to the same Dec-
laration. The fact came to the knowledge of Secretary Seward,
and the papers and despatches of Consul Bunch were at the
proper time intercepted. Subsequently they were forwarded,
through Mr. Adams, to the British Foreign Office. From these
papers it appeared that Mr. William Henry Trescot of South
Carolina, who had previously been in the diplomatic service of
the United States, was now serving as an intermediary between
Consul Bimch, acting on an intimation from Lord Lyons, and
Jeflferson Davis, looking to an imderstanding to be effected
with the Confederacy.
A new and extremely interesting dramatis persona here enters
on the scene; the strong individuality of Mr. Davis must now
be taken into account. Mr. Trescot met Davis at CJordonsville,
Virginia, while the latter, naturally elated over the victory just
won, was on his way back to Richmond fresh from the Bull
Run battle-field. Mr. Bancroft then says that a certain dis-
satisfaction at the way in which the negotiation now proposed
to him had been opened seemed to cloud Davis's perception of
the possible advantage to be derived from it. Instead, there-
fore, of at once acceding to the suggestion, and thereby estab-
lishing quasi relations with the governments of England and
France, Davis merely gave to the proposition a general approval,
promising to refer the question to the Confederate Congress.
This he subsequently did; and the Congress, in August, 1861,
* Seward, n. 195-203.
48
parsed a series of resolutions, drafted, it is said, by Davis him-
self,^ approving all the Articles of the Declaration of Paris ex-
cept that referring to privateers. The right of privateering was,
however, especially emphasized, and reserved.^
This seems to be a somewhat inadequate disposal of what was
in reaUty a crucial matter.^ It would really almost seem as if a
special Providence was then safeguarding the American Union
equally against the blimders of its friends and the machina-
tions of its enemies. The fact is that Jefferson Davis was at
just this jimcture obsessed with three accepted convictions,
each one of which in the close proved erroneous; but the three
together dictated his policy. These convictions were: (i) that
the decisive miUtary success just won at Manassas was final
as respects the establishment of the Confederacy as an indepen-
dent nationaUty; (2) that the control of cotton as a commercial
staple put it in the power of the Confederacy to dictate a for-
eign policy to the European powers; and (3) that the free is-
suance of letters of marque to privateers was a terribly destruc-
tive weapon of warfare in the hands of the insurgent States.
On these 'factors in the situation he now implicitly relied; and
time was yet to show him that, combined, they were but a
broken reed. Davis was, however, an essentially self-centred
and, in his way, an opinionated man. Implicitly believing he
now saw his way clearly, he acted accordingly; and what,
differently handled, might have proved a great opportunity
for the Confederacy, wholly escaped, unseen and neglected, j ;
1 Nicolay and Hay, iv. 279.
* [Journal of the Congress of the Confederate States of America, I. 341. These
resolutions were substituted, and apparentiy somewhat hastily, for others which
had recently been adopted by the Congress. The Journal shows that on July 30
Mr. Hunter of Virginia introduced a preamble and resolutions defining the posi-
tion of the Confederate States on points of maritime law, as laid down by the
Congress of Paris of 1856, which were referred to the Committee on Foreign
Affairs. On August 2 Mr. Rhett reported them back to the House, with a recom-
mendation that they pass. Six days after, on motion of Mr. Barnwell, the special
order was postponed to consider those resolutions, and the House passed them,
On the 9th Mr. Memminger, by unanimous consent, moved to reconsider the vote,
and the resolutions were laid on the table. August 13 Hunter submitted a new
set of resolutions as a substitute for those on the table, and the House acted at
once. The earlier resolutions were not printed in the Journal. Ed.]
* See also Nicolay and Hay, iv. 278-280, where the whole Declaration of Paris
negotiation, including the Bimch incident, receives in my judgment a treatment
both inadequate and mistaken. When that work was prepared, the facts of the
situation had been but imperfectly disclosed.
49
For, in the full light of subsequent developments and disclos-
ures, it is not difficult to see how a somewhat less self-confident
and provincial President of the Confederacy, and a somewhat
more astute and clear-sighted British Secretary of Foreign
Affairs, would, under conditions then existing, have availed
themselves of this opportumty to bring about the result which
Mr. Henry Adams asserts Earl Russell from the beginning
had in view. But for the good faith of Earl Russell in foUowing
out his policy of strict neutrality, and the apparent over-
confidence indulged in by Davis in consequence of the recent
Confederate success at B ull Run,^ the way lay open to a direct
and full recognition of the Confederacy. The inchoate nego-
tiation initiated by Consul Bunch was by him regarded as the
first step in that direction; and, as Mr. Trescot pointed out
to Davis, if Mr. Seward's loudly proclaimed threat was carried
out, that such recognition would be regarded by the United
States as a casus belli, Great Britain and France must, as a
succeeding and final step, be brought into the struggle as allies
of the Confederacy. As a result thereof the world might, as
Mr. Seward confidently anticipated, "be wrapped in fire";
but the blockade would surely be raised ! Jefferson Davis was
yet to learn that, with the blockade in force, no port for prizes
was open, and privateering was, consequently, pro hoc vice, an
antiquated and useless weapon m the armory of warfare. If
then it were abandoned by the Confederacy as the price of
such an alliance as that now suggested, the Confederate Brit-
ish-constructed cruiser would, with its prizes, have free ingress
to and egress from the ports not only of the Confederacy but
of Great Britain and France. However this might or might not
have proved the case, one thing is apparent: K the motive
and policy of the Palmerston-Russell CJovemment was in the
Siunmer of 1861 what Mr. Henry Adams so confidently asserts,
no better opportunity of reaching the end it had in view ever
presented itself than was presented in the course of the pro-
ceedings which have just been described.
* "There grew up [after the Battle of Bull Run] all over the South such a
perfect confidence in its strength and its perfect ability to work its own salvation
that very little care was felt for the action of Europe. In fact, the people were
just now quite willing to wait for recognition of their independence by Eiuropean
powers, until it was already achieved." De Leon, Four Years in R^d Capitals,
130.
50
Fortunately for the United States, the policy at this juncture
pursued by Earl Russell was far more straightforward, above-
board and direct than at the time he had credit for, especially
in America, or than the American Mmister in London then, or
Mr. Henry Adams since, has credited to him.^ In other words,
so far as the record shows. Earl Russell, at that time at least,
meant what he said, and carried himself accordingly. Mr. Henry
Adams, on the contrary, writing so lately as 1907, has expressed
his conviction that Earl Russell's management of the Declara-
tion of Paris negotiation "strengthened the belief that [he] had
started in May, 1861, with the assumption that the Confederacy
was established . . . and he was waiting only for the proper
moment to interpose.'' This, Mr. Henry Adams further asserts,
seemed at the time so self-evident that no one then in the Ameri-
can London Legation would have doubted the proposition "ex-
cept that Lord Russell obstinately denied the whole charge,
and persisted in assuring Minister Adams of his honest and
impartial neutrality. "^ If this was indeed the case, it can in the
full light of subsequent revelations only now be concluded that
the British Foreign Secretary was either truthful in his assev-
erations, or that in August, 1861, he failed to avail himself of
a most admirable opportimity to carry out his fixed policy, and
most effectually to "interpose."
Meanwhile, the confusion of speech intentionally created for
an xdterior purpose by Seward in May and June, 1861, has
continued indefinitely. Take our associate Mr. Schouler, for
instance. In his History he says: "the Palmerston ministry
* Mr. Adams, apparently as the result of later experience and calmer reflec-
tion, saw occasion to revise his opinion of Earl Russell's motives and official
action. In his opinion, as one of the Geneva Board of Arbitration, on the case
of the Florida y he expressed himself as follows: "... I hope I may not be ex-
ceeding my just limits if I seize this occasion to do a simple act of justice to
that eminent statesman. Much as I may see cause to d^er with him in his
limited construction of his own duty, or in the views which appear in these
papers to have been taken by him of the policy proper to be pursued by Her
Majesty's government, I am far from drawing any inferences from them to the
effect that he was actuated in any way by motives of ill-will to the United
States, or, indeed, by imworthy motives of any kind. If I were permitted to
judge from a calm comparison of. the relative weight of his various opinions
with his action in different contingencies, I should be led rather to infer a bal-
ance of good-will than of hostility to the United States." Papers relating to the
Treaty of Washington, iv. 162.
' Education of Henry Adains, 128. ,
I
SI
connived presently at an evasion by which such vessels ceased
strictly to be 'privateers' by receiving commissions from Jef-
ferson Davis as regular war-vessels of the Confederacy."^
And yet the distinction here referred to was manifest, fimda-
mental and universally recognized.^ The Sumter and the Ala-
bama, for instance, were constantly referred to in the papers
and memoirs of the time, sometimes as "privateers" and at
other times as "pirates." The Sumter, as already pointed
out, was a commissioned Confederate cruiser, hailing from a
Confederate port, and making its way to sea through a block-
ading squadron.* On the other hand, the single weak point in
the Alabama's position was that, built and equipped at public
Confederate cost, it had no home port of record, — that is,
built in England and equipped in a neutral harbor of refuge,
though sailing under Confederate colors it had never entered a
Confederate port. It was, however, duly commissioned by a
de facto government, and a belligerent recognized as such on
land even by the United States. Except in that single respect
of a home port, it was a regularly commissioned ship-of-war,
— just as much so as the Kearsarge. That a ship-of-war, the
property of a (fe facto government engaged in active war, was
built evasively of law in a private ship-yard of a neutral coun-
try, and throughout its entire life never entered a harbor of the
belligerent in whose service she sailed, certainly constituted an
anomaly. A naval anomaly is, however, not necessarily piracy;
nor is it at once apparent how a clause to that effect could, to
meet a novel case, be read into the accepted treatises on inter-
national usage. British in origin, equipment and crews, the
Confederate cruisers were homeless wanderers of the sea en-
gaged in an irregular, not to say discreditable work of destruc-
tion — a work very similar in character to the wanton destruc-
tion of property by fire during a military raid. They were,
^ History of the United States ^ vi. 126. Also Seward at Washingtonf n. 625.
* Moore, Digest, vn. 543-558.
> The case of the Sumter subsequently led to a long diplomatic correspondence
on the point referred to in the text. In his Digest (sec. 13 15) Moore says: " Special
attention may be directed to the note of Baron Van Zuylen of September 17,
1861, as a singularly forcible and able discussion of the question of asylimi."
"Mr. Seward, writing to Mr. Pike [our Minister to the Netherlands] on the
17th of October [186 1], declared that the Sumter 'was, by the laws and express
declaration of the United States, a pirate,' and protested against her receiving
the treatment of a man-of-war." Moore, Digest, vn. 986.
52
however, still cruisers — ships of war — publicly owned and
duly commissioned. In no respect privateers, they would not
under any recognized interpretation of language have come
within the Declaration of Paris inhibition of privateering.
Neither, while engaged in a somewhat piratical work, were they
in any common acceptance of the term pirates. Sailing imder a
recognized flag, they confined their ravages strictly to the com-
merce of an avowed belligerent. They were not conmion ene-
mies of mankind, Semmes and his sailors were, in a word,
pirates under the mimidpal law of the United States only in
the same way and to the same extent that Gen. J. H. Morgan
and his troopers when raiding in Ohio and Indiana, immedi-
ately after Gettysburg, were, under the same law, bandits.^
It is, it is true, well established, and was then notorious, that
when the Civil War began the Confederate authorities delib-
erately proposed to make Great Britain the basis of systematic
naval operations directed against the United States. This was
distinctly contrary to the principles of international comity,
if not law; and yet, incredible as it now seems, the English
courts in the case of the Alexandra maintained that practically,
and subject to certain almost formal legal observances, it was
a legitimate branch of British industry! Such an attitude on
the part of an English tribimal seems now incredible. Yet it
was then gravely assmned,^ and constituted for us a sound basis
for our subsequent demand for indemnity. No neutral nation,
of course, has a right under any drcimistances to permit itself
to be made a naval base for operations against a country with
which it is at peace; but its so doing does not transform an
otherwise recognized weapon of warfare into a crime against
the hmnan race.
Thus, according to my present understanding of what then
occurred, no groxmd appears for criticism of either Earl Russell
or Mr. Adams in connection with the abortive negotiation of
1 86 1. Earl Russell, adhering strictly to his policy of neutrality
^ Rhodes, v. 313-316.
* "From the nding of the judge it appeared that the Confederate Govern-
ment might with ease obtain as many vessels in this coimtry as they pleased with-
out in any manner violating our laws. It may be a great hardship to the Federals
that their opponents should be enabled to create a navy in foreign ports, but,
like many other hardships entailed on belligerents, it must be submitted to."
London Morning Post, August 10, 1863.
S3
in the American conflict then in progress, was compelled to have
recourse at times to what in the eyes of Mr. Adams seemed to
be disingenuous evasions; but this was in order to avoid pro-
posed commitments of the character and purport of which the
Foreign Secretary had been advised by Lord Lyons. The record
reveals nothing to justify a suspicion of Earl Russell's ulterior
purposes entertained by Mr. Adams at the time, or which con-
firms the inferences and conclusions of Mr. Henry Adams
since. As to Mr. Adams, he seems to have proceeded throughout
with a direct straightforwardness and manifest good faith which
at the time impressed Earl Russell with a feehng of confidence
productive thereafter of most beneficial results. Fully believ-
ing in the soundness of the policy proposed,^ and paying no
attention to the freely expressed doubts, fears, and otherwise-
minded conclusions of his colleagues and compatriots in Europe
at that jimcture, somewhat obtrusively thrust upon him,^ Mr.
•
* The American Case, Geneva Arbitration, i. 77.
' [A striking example of this distinctly impertinent intrusiveness at that
period of the poaching diplomat on the preserves more especially assigned to the
supervision of Mr. Adams (see Adams, Studies, Military and Diplomatic, 363-
367) was in this connection afforded by Gen. James Watson Webb, appointed
Minister to BrazU. On his way to his post, by way of London, General Webb
had an interview with the British Foreign Secretary. Of what passed in this
interview, he at the time gave the following account in a letter to President Lin-
coln, dated Southampton, August 22, 1861:
" Yesterday I spent at Pembrooke Lodge, with Lord John Russell and ... we
talked for two hours steadily on American affairs. ... I am opposed in toto
to the proposition of our Government to agree to a surrender of our right to issue
letters of marque, and send forth privateers in time of war; because the time of
making it exhibited weakness; because it cannot have the slightest influence
upon the pending questions, and because the Senate should and would reject
such a treaty, if made; and because I honestly and sincerely believe, that such a
treaty would be political ruin to both you and Mr. Seward; and with my friend-
ship for both of you, and a knowledge of the People gained in thirty-four years
of editorial life, it would be weak and criminal in me, if I did not frankly say to
both of you what I think; and then let the matter rest.
"Therefore I write this imdfficial letter to you instead of Seward; with a
request, however, that after reading it you will submit it to him for perusal. By
that time I shall be on my way to the far South [Brazil]; and if either of you do
not like my letter, coromit it to the flames. And, in fact, if the subject be not of
interest, I shall not complain if you bum it without reading.
"I told Lord John, that when Earl Ellesmere and other English statesmen at
Hatchford, just before I went to Paris, said we had refused to unite in putting
down privateering, I insisted that we never had refused our sanction to the prop-
osition; but on the contrary, cheerfully accepted of it, conditioned that the
European Powers would make it more philanthropic by rendering all private
property afloat on the ocean sacred from assault in time of war as well as in peace.
54
Adams carried out his instructions with unquestioning good
faith. There is, however, now reason to surmise that he did
Lord John replied, 'You were right; it was we who refused to put down privateer-
ing if by so doing all private property became sacred in time of war. England,
you know, could not consent to that.' 'Certainly not; and I justify you as an
English statesman, in consulting the interests of England by refusing your assent
to our rider on your bill. Of what use would be your enormous navy, if in time
of war you may not employ it against the commerce of the enemy? But what it
is wise and commendable for you to do for the benefit of English interests, it is
equally wise in us to do in self-defence. You refuse to respect private property
belonging to your enemy in time of war, because it is not your interest so to do;
and we refuse to put down privateering imless you go a step further, not because
we have any especial love for privateering, but because it is necessary for our
defence against your enormous navy, which you are compelled to keep up, and
which France forces you to augment. Your Lordship knows that it is contrary
to the genius of our people and the public sentiment, to keep up a large standing
army, or a great naval force in time of peace; and, therefore, as I explained to
Lord Ellesmere and his friends at Hatchford, and to Napoleon at Fontainebleau,
we resort to volunteers in time of war. You do not object to our volunteers on
land, why do you so to our marine volunteers, known as "privateers"? When
we call land volunteers into service, we make them subject to our rules and articles '
of war; and when we call out our naval volunteers, we in like manner, render
them subordinate to the rules and regulations for the government of the navy.
There is no difference between the two arms, except that the naval volunteers —
the privateers — are the most national of the two. The officers of the land or
army volimteers serve under commissions granted by the State authority; while
in all cases, the officers commanding a privateer (our naval volimteers) are com-
missioned by the general government. They are, in fact, as much and more a
part of the navy, as the volunteer force is a part of the army; and they render
unnecessary a large navy in time of peace. War always, more or less, interferes
with or altogether suspends commerce; and in time of war we invite our com-
mercial marine to volunteer for naval service, under commissions granted by the
Government, and subject to naval regulations, by holding out as an inducement
the possession of all the prizes they capture. This, in the event of a war with
England and the employment of our immense commercial marine, would soon
put us in a position to do as much injury to your conmierce as you, with your
immense navy, could inflict upon ours. But let us give up the right to employ
privateers, or in other words, our right to accept of volunteers in our naval ser-
vice, and the English merchant, instead of finding it his interest to be at peace
with us, would have offered hini a bounty to urge the Government to war; be-
cause, with your superior naval force, you would soon drive us from the ocean
and monopolize the commerce of the world.* Lord John laughed very heartily
at all this and said, 'but we never asked you to dispense with privateering. The
Paris conference made the suggestion, and it was not for us to refuse a good
thing; besides, we conceded what you had so long demanded, that free ships
should make free goods. But did you say all this to the Emperor? * 'Aye, and
more. I expressed my astonishment that he should have given his assent to a
proposition so palpably designed to increase the naval supremacy of England,
that it was clearly of English origin, no matter who brought it forward.' 'And
yet,* said Lord John, 'he did assent to it, and is in favor of it.' 'That by no
means follows. He had the sagacity to perceive that our people never would
assent, and, therefore, it was wise and diplomatic in him not to oppose England
55
not fully divine the purpose of his chief, being happily on that
point less fully and correctly advised than Earl Russell, then
Her Majesty's Secretary for Foreign Affairs.
As to Secretary Seward, the policy he at this juncture ad-
vocated, both directly and indirectly, as well as his utterances
in piursuance thereof, are more difficult to explain. As is ap-
parent from what has already been said, they invite analysis;
and, when analyzed, they are provocative of criticism. In con-
sidering that attitude and those utterances nearly twenty
years ago, Mr. Rhodes, in an extract already quoted, referred
to them as indicative of an "infatuation hard to understand.''
To Uke effect Mr. Adams, in the entry in his Diary already
quoted, wrote on receipt of Despatch No. lo, of May 21: "I
scarcely know how to understand Mr. Seward." Since then the
Welles Diary has been published, affording what is to a large
extent an inside view of the Lincoln Cabinet movements. So
far, however, as Seward is concerned, the enigma remains in
in her project. I do not say that such is his view of the subject; but we both
know that it would have been wise and diplomatic for him so to have acted; and
in so much as he is both wise and diplomatic, his having given his assent to the
proposition by no means proves him to be in favor of it. My own opinion is that
he would hold us in contempt and never forgive us, if we were to prove untrue
to ourselves and give England this great advantage over France as well as our-
selves.' Lord John then went on to say, that altogether too much importance
has been given to the subject, *but as your present Government desire it, we will
make the treaty, even if, as you say, it is certain to be rejected.' I said, I hoped
not, because its rejection would only lead to other complications and discussions.
He replied, *Not a bit of it. I am perfectly willing the treaty should be rejected,
because I have long been of opinion that no treaty stipulations would be of any
avail. War once commenced, you would only have to call your privateers " the
volunteer navy," or some other equally appropriate term, instead of "privateers,"
change somewhat the regulations*with the name, and according to your own argu-
ment they would become part of your navy for the time being, and be respected
accordingly, by all other Powers. So we will give your administration the treaty
they ask for, and they must then settle the matter with your Senate. They may
accept or reject it at their pleasure, for it would amount to nothing; but I rather
like the manner in which you put to the Emperor the advantage conceded to us
by the Paris conference.'"
Webb sent a copy of this letter to Mr. Dayton, who replied, August 26:
"I have read with great care and interest your letter to the Prest. a copy of
which you enclosed. As it is unofficial, of course you could rightfully send it to
head-quarters direct, and I am glad you did so.
" That negotiations as to Privateering is likely to break off after all. Lord John
and Mr. Thouvenel want to add an outside declaration at the time of the execu-
tion of the Treaty which I will not agree to — nor will Mr. Adams. This is of
course altogether confidential, but my impression is, that with your letters to
Seward &c. it will for the present end the matter." Ed.]
56
largest degree unsolved. It has been suggested that at this
juncture the Secretary of State was, like every one else, "groj>-
ing his way"; or, again, that he, individually, had "lost his
head." Amid the sudden uncertainties and grave perplexities
which surroimded him, in common with all others, neither sup-
position is to be dismissed as beyond reasonable consideration;
but that he should then seriously and persistently have advo-
cated a general foreign war, or that he should have exerted him-
self to the utmost through indirections to involve the country in
such a war without any imderstanding reached in advance with
his chief and his colleagues, seems incredible. Yet the record
apparently establishes such as having been the case. He seems,
in fact, to have been wrong-headed rather than to have
"lost his head"; and to have persisted in a path at once
devious and erroneous rather than to have been "groping his
way."
Dealing with the distinct period of the Civil War between the
attack on Fort Sumter and the defeat at Bull Rim, it is in jus-
tice to every one concerned necessary constantly to recall the
fact that it was throughout formative. It was formative as re-
spects foreign relations quite as much as in its domestic bear-
ings. It is in evidence and indisputable that when the Fort
Sumter crisis was imminent the Secretary of State urged on the
President the expediency of forcing immediately a foreign
complication. There is also groimd to believe, although on
. this head the evidence is not absolutely conclusive, that so in-
tent was Seward on at any rate postponing a civil-war outbreak,
in the hope that a foreign complication could yet be substituted
therefor, that when the Fort Sumter expedition was in course of
preparation he caused secret advices thereof to be conveyed to
the Confederate authorities, apparently with a view of having
the expedition fail without bringing on an irrevocable crisis,
or at any rate having the government at Washington appear
as the provoker of strife by striking the first blow.^ This, by
any and every device, he sought to postpone. He did not suc-
ceed; and the catastrophe occurred. Nevertheless, he seems
even then not to have thrown off his delusion as to the possible
1 On this point, see Bancroft, Seward j n. 145; letter of Montgomery Blair
of May 13, 1873, in Welles, Lincoln and Seward, 58, 66; Welles, Diary, i. 9, 32;
II. 160, 248.
57
reconciliatory effect of a foreign complication; and it continued
with him until after the catastrophe at Bull Rim. Indulging in
a belief that Confederate resistance would prove a delusion, and
would collapse under the first blow from Washington, he pre-
pared the Despatch No. lo of May 21. It is not generally
understood that in the original draft of this highly aggressive
commimication Mr. Adams was instructed to confine himself
"simply to a delivery of a copy of this paper to the Secretary of
State [Russell], and then to break off all official intercourse
with the British CJovernment." Further instructions were
then given him as to what policy should be pursued "when in-
tercourse shall have been arrested from this cause." ^ As orig-
inally drawn, the despatch amounted practically to a declara-
tion of war; as such, it will be remembered, it was modified in
essential respects by the President only in face of strong oppo-
sition on the part of the Secretary.^ J
Even while penning this despatch, Seward moreover put on
record an utter misapprehension of his own position, writing to
his wife: "A country so largely relying on my poor efforts to
save it had refused me the full measure of its confidence, need-
ful to that end. I am a chief reduced to a subordinate position,
and surrounded by a guard, to see that I do not do too much
for my coimtry." Mr. Bancroft, therefore, in his Life^ does not
apparently go too far when he says that at this time Seward
was the "victim of an incomprehensible iUusion," adding:
"The only theory on which this illusion can be explained, even
from his point of view, is that by giving full play to his imagina-
tion he was strengthened in the belief that the Union could not
be restored xmless the 'chief could get free from his 'subordinate
position' and push aside the 'guard' that was preventing him
from doing too much for his country, and that all could be ac-
compUshed by means of a foreign war, which would put him in
control, because it would grow out of questions within the
province of his duties."
Whatever his policy may have been, therefore, it would seem
that the Secretary of State was practically thwarted in his
efforts to carry it out, and reduced into what he himself consid-
ered a "subordinate position." In view of what has already
* Nicolay and Hay, iv. 271. « Russell, My Diary, July 3, i86i.
• Seward, n. 173.
58
been said in this paper, it is hardly necessary to point out that
the "guard" referred to in the foregoing extract from Mr. Ban-
croft's Life was Senator Sumner, then alluded to by Mr. Seward
as a supernumerary Secretary of State in Washington, accord-
ing to Mr. Welles "far too frequently consulted on controverted
or disputed international questions." ^ The evidence on this
head is not, however, confined to Mr. Welles. In a passage from
his Diary already quoted, it will be remembered that Russell at-
tributes this thwarting of action on the part of Seward largely to
the intervention of Senator Siunner. Mr. Sumner was certainly
in Washington at the time the Despatch No. lo was approved
by the President "with its teeth drawn," and he went back to
Boston in so excited a frame of mind that Mr. Dana, whom he
shortly afterwards met, wrote to Mr. Adams that he was "so
full of denunciations of Mr. Seward that it was suggestive of a
heated state of brain." Mr. Dana added: "He cannot talk
five minutes without bringing in Mr. Seward, and always in
bitter terms of denunciation. His mission is to expose and de-
nounce Mr. Seward; and into that mission he puts all his usual
intellectual and moral energy." According to Mr. Sunmer,
Seward was systematically "pursuing a course of correspond-
ence, language, and manner calculated to bring England and
France to coldness, if not to open rupture." ^ Then a mys-
tery, what Mr. Sumner had in mind has now been disclosed.
He spoke not altogether unadvisedly.^
In that portion of his History relating to this period Mr.
Rhodes says: "A fair statement of Northern sentiment by the
4th of July [1861] is that, although most of the rebels would be
pardoned by a gracious government, Jefferson Davis and the
men captured on board of vessels bearing his letters of marque
should be hanged." * In other words, during the period under
consideration the coimtry as well as Mr. Seward had for the time
* Welles, Lincoln and Seward, 90, 161, 185.
* C. F. Adams Mss., Boston, June 4, 1861.
!• "Mr. Sumner, as the Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations, is
supposed to be viewed with some jealousy by Mr. Seward, on account of the dis-
position attributed to him to interfere in diplomatic questions; but if he does so,
we shall have no reason to complain, as the Senator is most desirous of keeping
the peace between the two coimtries, and of mollifying any little acerbities and
irritations which may at present exist between them." Russell, Diary, July 5,
1861.
* Vol. ra. 429.
59
being abdicated all sanity of judgment. Confident of an early
and decisive military success, both the Secretary of State and
the community at large were disposing in advance of the spoils
and captives. The Secretary was, also, in the way natural to
him, arranging a diplomatic program in which scant, if any,
consideration was to be shown foreign nations. In other words,
he was preparing a theatrical appeal to that spirit of American
nationality in the might of which he had such implicit, if some-
what sentimental, faith.
Such then, so far as the evidence warrants conclusions, was
the attitude of Mr. Seward, and such the policy he strove to
impose. That policy was, it would also appear, based on several
propositions almost equally erroneous. First, he quite misap-
prehended the situation as respected his chieftaincy in the
conduct of the administration, and responsibility therefor.
Second, he labored under a delusion as to the feeling existing in
the commxmity composing the Confederacy. Third, and most
dangerous of all, was his deception connected with the ques-
tion of privateering as a weapon in modem warfare, whether
in the hands of the Confederacy as against the Union, or in the
hands of the national government as against foreign nations,
especially this last. As already more than once pointed out,
Seward seems to have really believed that it was but necessary
for the United States, as representative of democracy, to raise
its hand, to cause, as he himself was wont to express it, "the
world to be wrapped in fire.''
That it should have been possible for a representative New
York politician to indulge in good faith in such a degree of in-
fatuation hitherto has constituted, and will probably long con-
tinue to constitute, an historical enigma. That it was in his
case a passing delusion is true; as also that in its more publicly
dangerous form it did not survive the shock of July 21st.
Meanwhile, during the period of obsession, so to speak, the
danger of privateering and the use of privateering seem to have
been always present to the Secretary's mind. It was privateer-
ing, moreover, of the type of fifty years before, — that in vogue
in his youth, during the War of 181 2. Accordingly, in his de-
spatch of the 2ist of May, he wrote to Mr. Adams that "Hap-
pily, Her Britannic Majesty's Government can avoid all these
difficulties. It invited us in 1856 to accede to the Declaration
6o
of Paris, of which body Great Britain was herself a member,
abolishing privateering ever)rwhere in all cases and forever."
He then suggests a negotiation, sa)dng that Mr. Adams already
had authority to propose the accession of the United States to
the Paris Declaration, and inviting him to negotiate to that
end.^
The trouble with Mr. Seward's subsequent position was
simple, — it was impossible! He wished to do, and yet not to
do. He wanted to commit the insurgents as included in the
sovereignty of the United States, but not to commit the United
States, in case of hostilities with European powers growing
out of the existing complications. He could not bring himself
to admit that a blockade conducted under the rules of inter-
national law was impossible except as an act of belligerency,
and that belligerency implied two parties to it. This necessary
and inevitable proposition both of logic and international
usage he obstinately refused to admit. In other words, so far
as accession to the Declaration of Paris was concerned, Mr.
Seward during the period in question seems mentally to have
exerted himself to the extent of self -persuasion that the conflict
in which the coimtry was engaged was a war so far as the United
States was concerned, and a war or not a war so far as the
foreign powers were concerned, as the interest of the United
States might dictate. Moreover, he confidently maintained it
was a war conducted in accordance with established inter-
national usage, to which so far as foreign nations were affected
there was but a single party, — that party representing abso-
lute sovereignty, while, under some nile vaguely alluded to as
in existence, the insurrectionary power was composed not of
belligerents but solely of bandits and pirates — outlaws.
That he might possibly have succeeded in this diplomatic
tour de force, had the United States forces achieved a decisive
and brilliant success at Bull Rim, is within the range of possi-
bilities. In view of what actually occurred, this possibility is,
however, hardly worthy of consideration. It is sufficient here
to say that the policy of Mr. Seward during the three months
in question, so far as the actual record shows, was based on
misapprehension; misapprehension not less of the position he
himself occupied than of the situation as it existed both in the
* Nicolay and Hay, iv. 273.
6i
Confederacy and in Europe. Moreover, his contentions were
quite devoid of any foundation in the accepted principles of
international law. Somewhat transparent, the carrying of his
scheme into actual operation would almost necessarily have
resulted in a practical challenge of foreign nations at once to
recognize the Confederacy as a member of the family of
nations. It is difficult indeed to see how it could well have
failed so to do. Ill-advised, illogical, and contradictory, the
diplomatic policy pursued during this brief and early stage of
the Civil War constitutes almost as complete an enigma now
as it did to Mr. Adams then, or thirty years later to Mr.
Rhodes. In many aspects it is, and is likely to remain, im-
possible of satisfactory explanation for the simple reason that
it is incomprehensible.
Thus, in the outcome of this inquiry, I find myself back at the
point of commencement. As a diplomatic episode, the abortive
negotiation over the accession of the United States to the
articles of the Declaration of Paris bore a strong family re-
semblance to the equally abortive though far more disgrace-
ful and calamitous military performance known as the first
Manassas advance. Both Were ill-considered incidents, in no
respect creditable, characteristic of a distinct because a danger-
ously emotional period in the history of the American people,
— that is, the himdred days between Fort Sumter and Bull
Rim.
^ ( • • •
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