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CHAPTER V.

UPRISING OF THE NORTH.

REJOICING IN THE SOUTH.-WASHINGTON THREATENED.-LINCOLN CALLS FOR TROOPS.-ENTHUSIASM IN THE NORTH.-75,000 COFFINS WANTED.-SECESSION OF VIRGINIA.-HELP FOR WASHINGTON.-MASSACHUSETTS TROOPS MOBBED IN BALTIMORE.-WASHINGTON IN A STATE OF SIEGE. THE NEW YORK SEVENTH AND THE MASSACHUSETTS EIGHTH.-BEN. BUTLER.-OLD IRONSIDES.-RAILWAY REPAIRING.-ROOM ENOUGH TO BURY SEVENTY-FIVE THOUSAND.-I MUST HAVE TROOPS.-BALTIMORE OVERAWED.-HARPER'S FERRY BURNED.-DESTRUCTION OF THE GOSPORT NAVY YARD.-THE BLOCKADE PROCLAIMED.-CONFEDERATE PRIVATEERS.NORTH CAROLINA SECEDES-MORE VOLUNTEERS WANTED.-CAPTURE OF CAMP JACKSON, ST. LOUIS.-UNION FEELING IN KENTUCKY.

HE news of the fall of Sumter was received with rejoicing

THE of the fall with

throughout the Southern States. Salutes were fired, bells were rung, and Confederate flags were everywhere displayed. In a speech in Montgomery, Mr. Walker, the Confederate Secretary of War, predicted that before the first of May the Confederate flag would float over Washington City. Indeed, this was common talk in all parts of the South, and in Virginia was sung a song, the first verse of which ended:

"The Union it is done

The secession flag, ere many months,

Will wave o'er Washington!"*

In the Northern States the report of the surrender was scarcely believed, although a telegram announcing it had been. published in the New York Herald of Sunday, April 14; but when the newspapers of Monday morning appeared with the proclamation of President Lincoln, calling for seventy-five thousand volunteers to aid in the execution of the laws, suspense was at an end. Up to this time the North had been divided. The party feeling stirred up in the Presidential election had not yet died out, and Democrats and Republicans were still suspicious of each other, and apt to find fault with every expression of each others' opinions. There were very few, too, on either side, who had ever believed that the quarrel would end in blood, and while many were openly denouncing any act which would tend to bring about that result, all were quietly

*See Appendix, page 563,

pursuing their every-day business, hoping that the troubles would soon end in compromise and peace. But the fall of Sumter and the President's call for troops awoke everybody from his dream, and the people of the North rose as one man to defend the flag. Enthusiastic meetings, in which citizens of all political opinions took part, were held in the different cities, large sums of money were subscribed for the cause of the Union, and the free States vied with each other in raising troops and in putting them in the field.

The news of the President's call for troops was received by the Confederate Congress sitting at Montgomery with "derisive laughter," and the following epigram was published in some of the newspapers as an answer:

"Davis answers, rough and curt,

With mortar, paixhan, and petard;
Sumter is ours, and nobody hurt:

We tender Old Abe our Beau-regard."

A Mobile newspaper published an advertisement as follows:

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"Proposals will be received to supply the Confederacy with 75,000 BLACK COFFINS.

No proposals will be entertained coming north of Mason and Dixon's Line. Direct to

"JEFF. DAVIS, Montgomery, Ala."

Some have tried to show that this advertisement was authorized by Mr. Davis to show contempt for Mr. Lincoln's proclamation, but of course it was only a newspaper jest.

The War Department at Washington asked the eight slave States which had not yet seceded to furnish their quota of the seventy-five thousand men wanted, but nearly all their governors refused. There had been a strong Union feeling in Virginia up to this time, but the fall of Sumter had strengthened the secessionists, and the President's proclamation had discouraged the Unionists, and on April 17 the convention in session at Richmond passed an ordinance of secession, providing, however, that it should be submitted to a vote of the people of the State. There was considerable opposition to this act, especially in the western counties of the State, and the result was that the Unionists of those counties soon after (June 17) formed a sepa

1861.]

THE BALTIMORE MOB.

65

rate government, with Francis H. Pierpont as Governor. They claimed to be the true government of Virginia, on the ground that the loyal people of a State are the State. They finally separated from Virginia and formed a new State, at first called Kanawha, after the principal river, but afterward West Virginia, which was admitted into the Union in 1862.

The rumors that Washington would soon be attacked had been rife for some time, and as the danger had increased after the secession of Virginia, troops were hastily sent forward to guard it against surprise. The first volunteers to reach there were from Pennsylvania, but the

first full regiment to answer the President's call for troops was the Sixth Massachusetts, which left Boston in the afternoon of April 17. They arrived in Baltimore about noon of Friday, April 19, and while. passing through the streets from the Camden to the Washington station were assailed by a mob with stones, clubs, and pistols. After three of the soldiers had been killed, and several wounded, part of the regiment fired on the mob, killing eleven and wounding many others. The regiment at last reached the depot, and

the train hastened to Washington, SOLDIER OF THE MASSACHUSETTS though it was fired on several times

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SIXTH.

by the way, and in one place rails were found torn up from the track.

The coming of the Massachusetts men gave great joy to the Unionists in Washington, who were filled with anxiety lest the city should be attacked. General Scott had done what he could to secure the public buildings. The doors and windows of the Capitol were barricaded, and cannon and ammunition were taken into it, and cannon were placed in the halls of the Treasury Building. The streets were patrolled at night by armed citizens, and soldiers were quartered in the great East Room of the White House to act as a body-guard to the President.

On the 19th of April, the very day when the Sixth Massa

chusetts was attacked in the streets of Baltimore, the Eighth Massachusetts, another regiment of the same brigade, marched through the streets of New York on its way to Washington. General Benjamin F. Butler, the commander of the brigade, accompanied this regiment, which was followed a few hours later by the Seventh New York, under Colonel Marshal Lefferts, then, as now, one of the finest regiments of the city. There was great excitement in New York, and the regiments were greeted as they marched down Broadway with waving flags and

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THE EAST ROOM OF THE WHITE HOUSE IN 1861.

the cheers of thousands of people, who packed the sidewalks and filled every window along the route.

Baltimore being completely in the hands of the disunionists, General Butler went with his regiment directly to Annapolis, the capital of Maryland, and the seat of the United States. Naval Academy. He arrived in the night, and found the city lighted up, and the secessionists there waiting for the arrival of men from Baltimore, intending to take possession of the frigate Constitution, then used at the Academy as a school-ship. The sight of "Old Ironsides," almost as old as the Union itself, and endeared to every American by her glorious career as the conqueror of the Guerriere, the Cyane, the Levant, and the Java,

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RAILWAY REPAIRING.

67

roused the enthusiasm of the Massachusetts men, and they determined to save her. General Butler asked if there were any men in his regiment who could sail a ship. Fifty-three men stepped from the ranks, one of whom was the son of the man who built the Constitution. These were put on board the old ship, and she was sent safely to New York. Shortly afterward the New York Seventh arrived, and Gen

eral Butler felt strong enough to move

toward Washington.

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The railway route from Annapolis to Washington can be easily understood from the map (p. 69). The secessionists, determined that troops should not pass through Maryland, had torn up a large part of the railroad track between Annapolis and Annapolis Junction, where the road joins the Washington Branch Railroad, between Baltimore and Washington. General Butler, seeing the necessity of this road, determined to open it and hold it. He seized the railway station, and finding there a locomotive which the secessionists had disabled so that it would not work, called on his regiment for men to repair it. A man named Homans stepped out of the ranks and, after carefully examining it, said:

"I think I can do it, General; I helped PRIVATE OF THE SEVENTH to build it." With the aid of other

NEW YORK.

machinists from the regiment, the engine was soon in order and at work. The rails were then hunted up in the woods, in gullies, and other places where they had been hidden, and relaid, and bridges rebuilt. At one place some rails had been thrown into deep water at a bridge crossing, but an amphibious Yankee dived for them and found them. The two regiments moved forward carefully, marching all day and all night, rebuilding the road, and keeping a close watch lest they should be fired on from the woods and other lonely places, but they were not molested, for the whole country appeared to be deserted. On the morning of April 25, Annapolis Junction was reached,

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